Church of England: Ban "Ex-Gay" Conversion Therapy

By far a minority of states in the United States - but nonetheless, a growing number - have banned fraudulent "ex-gay" conversion therapy for those under 18 years of age.  The practice has been a cash cow for the bogus "ministries" and "Christian counseling centers" who have  marketed the "ex-gay" "change programs."   Moreover, the myth that they have sought to maintain (namely, that sexual orientation is a choice) has long been used as a political weapon by Christofascists to oppose LGBT non-discrimination laws and ordinances.   I have been actively working to show how dangerous and fraudulent these programs are since 20013.  An article here looks at the take down of Michael Johnston, one of the leading "ex-gay" poster boys of the Christian Right.  Now, the Church of England is call for the fraudulent practice to be banned in the United Kingdom.  A piece in The Guardian looks at this surprising and most welcomed development.  Be assured that Tony Perkins of FRC, Victoria Cobb of The Family Foundation in Richmond, Brian Brown of the National Organization for Marriage and similar charlatans are likely shrieking at this news.  Here are excerpts from The Guardian:

The Church of England has called on the government to ban conversion therapy and has condemned the practice, which aims to change sexual orientation, as unethical and potentially harmful.

At the end of an emotional debate in which two members of the C of E synod described their experiences as spiritual abuse, the church’s governing body overwhelmingly backed a motion saying the practice had “no place in the modern world”.

Conversion therapy is usually described as an attempt to change a person’s sexual orientation or gender identity. Some churches in the C of E and other denominations have encouraged LGBT members to take part in prayer sessions and other activities to rid them of their “sin”.

Proposing the motion, Jayne Ozanne – who underwent conversion therapy resulting in two breakdowns and two spells in hospital – said conversion therapy was “abuse from which vulnerable adults need protecting”.

It was “discredited by the government, the NHS, the Royal College of Psychiatrists, the Royal College of General Practitioners and many other senior health care bodies,” she said.

Quoting from a statement issued earlier this year by the UK Council for Psychotherapy and other bodies, she said: “Exclusion, stigma and prejudice may precipitate mental health issues for any person subjected to these abuses.”

John Sentamu, the archbishop of York, said conversion therapy was “theologically unsound, so the sooner the practice of [it] is banned, I can sleep at night”.

Paul Bayes, the bishop of Liverpool, said LGBT orientation was neither a crime nor a sin. “We don’t need to engage people in healing therapy if they are not sick.”

Fenella Cannings-Jurd, a student at Durham university, said she found it hard to believe that “in 2017 we are seriously debating the pros and cons of conversion therapy”. It was “by and large” seen as a violation of basic human rights, she said.

The final vote, after a complicated series of amendments, was 298 to 74, with 26 abstentions. The motion had the backing of all three houses of the synod, the bishops, clergy and laity.

Speaking before the debate, Ozanne said she wanted the church to make a clear public statement. As the established church “we can encourage other denominations and faiths to consider their positions on this”, she said.

Conversion therapy was particularly prevalent in minority ethnic Pentecostal denominations, and in some extreme cases young people were sent back to their family’s country of origin for “corrective rape”.

"Corrective rape" - I suspect that Jesus would not have been an advocate of such batshitery and violent abuse.  I tried to "pray away the gay" for 37 years and I can assure you, it does NOT work.  Kudos to the Church of England.  Hopefully, more American denominations will follow the example and condemn this fraudulent practice which epitomizes right wing Christians' embrace of ignorance.

Social Science Research Journal: Mark Regnerus Study on Gay Parenting Deeply Flawed

Mark Regnerus (pictured at left), who authored a anti-gay, far right funded study, titled “How Different Are the Adult Children of Parents Who Have Same-Sex Relationships?, continues to take a beating for his flawed and biased work.  Now the journal that first published the study has conducted its own audit and concluded that the Regnerus study is deeply flawed.   Indeed, the conclusion is that the journal should never have published the study.  To me, Regnerus is typical of those who conduct studies that become lauded by the gay haters.  He seemly determined the result he wanted and then structured the study to prove that predetermined result.  The Houston Chronicle has coverage on the conclusions of Social Science Research which will appear in the November, 2012, issue of the journal.  Here are highlights:

The peer-review process failed to identify significant, disqualifying problems with a controversial and widely publicized study that seemed to raise doubts about the parenting abilities of gay couples, according to an internal audit scheduled to appear in the November issue of the journal, Social Science Research, that published the study.

The highly critical audit, a draft of which was provided to The Chronicle by the journal’s editor, also cites conflicts of interest among the reviewers, and states that “scholars who should have known better failed to recuse themselves from the review process.”

Since it was published last month, the study, titled “How Different Are the Adult Children of Parents Who Have Same-Sex Relationships?,” has been the subject of numerous news articles and blog posts. It has been used by opponents of same-sex marriage to make their case, and it’s been blasted by gay-rights activists as flawed and biased.

[T]he editor of Social Science Research, James D. Wright, has been at the receiving end of an outpouring of anger over the paper. At the suggestion of another scholar, Wright, a professor of sociology at the University of Central Florida, assigned a member of the journal’s editorial board—Darren E. Sherkat, a professor of sociology at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale—to examine how the paper was handled.
 
Among the problems Sherkat identified is the paper’s definition of “lesbian mothers” and “gay fathers”—an aspect that has been the focus of much of the public criticism. A woman could be identified as a “lesbian mother” in the study if she had had a relationship with another woman at any point after having a child, regardless of the brevity of that relationship and whether or not the two women raised the child as a couple.  Sherkat said that fact alone in the paper should have “disqualified it immediately” from being considered for publication.

In reality, only two respondents lived with a lesbian couple for their entire childhoods, and most did not live with lesbian or gay parents for long periods, if at all.


Sherkat, however, called the presentation of the data “extremely misleading.” Writes Sherkat: “Reviewers uniformly downplayed or ignored the fact that the study did not examine children of identifiably gay and lesbian parents, and none of the reviewers noticed that the marketing-research data were inappropriate for a top-tier social-scientific journal.”

Sherkat was an early critic of the paper, even before he was chosen to conduct the audit. He also said in an interview that he had “little respect for conservative religiosity” and believes that Regnerus and some other socially conservative scholars push a political agenda in their academic work. In a paper published last year, he wrote about how religion and political affiliation affects support for same-sex marriage.

“There should be reflection about a conservative scholar garnering a very large grant from exceptionally conservative foundations,” he writes in the audit, “to make incendiary arguments about the worthiness of LGBT parents—and putting this out in time to politicize it before the 2012 United States presidential election.”

 As Sherkat writes: “[I]t is unfair to expect Wright to hear the warning sirens when none were sounded by the reviewers.”  Wright points out (as Regnerus himself wrote) that the paper could be read as supportive of gay marriage because it seems to indicate that more-stable households produce less-troubled children. “This does not sound like spiteful gay-bashing to me,” Wright contends in his response. “It sounds like a perfectly reasonable conclusion.”

It's safe to conclude that anti-gay hate groups and the National Organization for Marriage will continue to quote Regnerus' study as if it's the Holy Grail.  Sadly, truthfulness and honesty are nowhere on the Christianist radar screen.

University of Texas Opens Inquiry of Regnerus Gay Parenting Study

UPDATED:  I missed this article earlier:  200 Ph.D.s and M.D.s and professionals in sociology, psychiatry and other relevant fields have sent a letter to James Wright, editor of “Social Science Research,” the journal where Regnerus’s study was published with a companion piece by the known anti-gay bigot Loren Marks. Here's a sampling from the letter:

As researchers and scholars, many of whom with extensive experience in quantitative and qualitative research in family structures and child outcomes, we write to raise serious concerns about the most recent issue of Social Science Research and the set of papers focused on parenting by lesbians and gay men. In this regard, we have particular concern about Mark Regnerus’ paper entitled “How different are the adult children of parents who have same-sex relationships? Findings from the New Family Structures Study.”

While the presence of a vibrant and controversial public debate should in no way censor scholarship, it should compel the academy to hold scholarship around that topic to our most rigorous standards. We are very concerned that these standards were not upheld in this issue or with this paper, . . . .

In this letter, we detail the specific concerns that lead us to request that you publicly disclose the reasons for both the expedited peer review process of this clearly controversial paper and the choice of commentators invited to submit critiques. We further request that you invite scholars with specific expertise in LGBT parenting issues to submit a detailed critique of the paper and accompanying commentaries for publication in the next issue of the journal.

We question the process by which this paper was submitted, reviewed, and accepted for publication.

As I said, I hope that this is the beginning of the end of Regenerus' career.  Or at least in legitimate academia. *
* 
I have been very critical of the right wing funded and extremely flawed gay parenting "study" conducted by Mark Regnerus (pictured at right) of the University of Texas.  The study used very flawed samples for supposed children of gay parents and, in fact, had all the hallmarks of a Christianist propaganda piece aimed at maligning and denigrating gays and lesbians as parents.  The study has been condemned both by gay rights organizations and mental health organizations.  Now, faced with almost universal condemnation except from anti-gay hatr groups, the University of Texas has opened an investigation into Regenerus' study.  One can only hoe that the university will take appropriate disciplinary action against Regenerus who haw certainly harmed the university's reputation as a serious academic institution. Here are highlights from The New Civil Rights Movement:

Between January, 2011 and June of 2012, Mark Regnerus of the University of Texas, Austin, plotted, carried out and then had published a “study” of dubious scholarly merit, alleged to show, but not actually showing, that homosexual parents are dangerous to children.

Funding for the Regnerus study was arranged through the National Organization For Marriage‘s Robert P.George along with George’s anti-gay-rights colleagues at The Witherspoon Institute and the Bradley Foundation. George is an author of the anti-gay NOM pledge signed by Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

This reporter mailed a Scientific Misconduct complaint about Regnerus to University of Texas President William Powers, Jr. on June 21.  On June 25, UTA Research Integrity Officer Dr. Robert Peterson told me in an e-mail that he will be conducting an inquiry as per university policy.  

“The purpose of the investigation is to: explore in detail the allegations; examine the evidence in depth; and, determine specifically whether misconduct has been committed, by whom, and to what extent. The investigation also will determine whether there are additional instances of possible misconduct that would justify broadening the scope beyond the initial allegations.”

The very name of the Regnerus’s project, “The New Family Structures Study,” is deceptive — and is an anti-gay bigot dog whistle — in ways characteristic of Regnerus’s funder NOM’s Robert George of the Witherspoon Institute and the Bradley Foundation.

Because of that, and for reasons elaborated below, this reporter insists that for its Scientific Misconduct inquiry of Regnerus, the University of Texas, Austin must examine in its investigation, and provide, copies of all written communications, and notes, such as of phone conversations, and all other documentation of the relationship between Mark Regnerus and The Witherspoon Institute from the time those two parties first considered a study about children of gay parents, to include the time that Witherspoon gave Regnerus a $35,000 “planning grant” and subsequent to when the plan had been formulated and Witherspoon approved Regnerus for his full study funding.

Regnerus’s claim that the probability-based web panel that he used is the best of all existing sampling methods for surveying gay fathers and lesbian mothers is false, totally and utterly false. For his sampling, Regnerus relied on the company Knowledge Networks to find his survey respondents through Knowledge Networks’ existing panelist system, which is based on a combination of random digit dialing sampling and address-based sampling.

To sum this point up; 1) Regnerus likely misleads when he asserts he compared young adult children of gay parents to young adult children of “intact biological families;” 2) In the study itself, and in his public promotions of the study, Regnerus likely misleads when he states that he would not by any means have been able to survey an adequate sampling of young gay adults substantially raised by gay parents up through the 1990s; and 3) Regnerus likely misleads when he states that he used the best existing survey method for surveying young adult children of gay parents.

Regnerus’s funder Robert George of the anti-gay National Organization for Marriage is obsessively concerned with “the legal boundaries of marriage.” Robert George has written a draft for a federal constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriages throughout the nation. He does not like to see gay parenting study results with good child outcomes, as they are work against his known, ferocious anti-gay political goals. George’s aims in arranging for the funding of Regnerus’s study precisely match the concerns expressed in Regnerus’s introduction.

Regnerus has been promoting his study as evidence against expansion of legal recognition of gay couples’ relationships. In one of his Slate articles, Regnernus wrote that gay-rights “advocates would do well from here forward to avoid simply assuming the kids are all right,” and then, after barely paying lip service to the notion that marriage recognition could perhaps help children being raised by gay parents, he ends his article by saying that the New Family Structures Study  “may suggest that the household instability that the NFSS reveals is just too common among same-sex couples to take the social gamble of spending significant political and economic capital to esteem and support this new (but tiny) family form while Americans continue to flee the stable, two-parent biological married model, the far more common and accomplished workhorse of the American household, and still—according to the data, at least—the safest place for a kid.”

Robert George’s Witherspoon Institute – a Regnerus funder — has devoted a stand-alone site to the Regnerus and Marks studies – where the Regnerus Slate article with the aforementioned offending quote is at the top of the site’s list of study-related articles “From the Web.”

Again, a thorough investigation is needed and, if worse case suspicions are confirmed about the seemingly deliberately biased nature of Regenerus' study,  Regenerus ought to be dismissed from the University of Texas faculty.  From what I've seen to date, Regenerus is little better that the long discredited Paul Cameron who first decided the outcome he wanted and then manipulated the "study sample" to achieve the result he had preordained.

Anti-Gay Leaders Want California Senate to Vote No on Ban On "Ex-Gay" Therapy

As regular readers know, I view few things as being more fraudulent and harmful than "ex-gay" therapy a/k/a reparative therapy.  It doesn't work - as even the head of Exodus International has more or less admitted - and causes emotional and psychological harm for gays who are striving to change something unchangeable. The truth, of course, means nothing to the "godly Christian" crowd who view "ex-gay ministries" as (i) cash cows (some programs charge thousands of dollars for the worthless "therapy") and, more importantly (ii) useful political tools to further the myth that gays change "change" and, therefore deserve absolutely no legal anti-discrimination protections, not to mention same sex marriage rights.   California is the first state poised to potentially ban "ex-gay" therapy for those under the age of 18 and require older patients - victims is a better term - to be provided with disclaimers that basically advise them that the "ex-gay" therapies do not work.  Needless to say, the Christofascists are having conniption fits and the spittle is flying by the bucket full.  The Advocate has a piece that looks at the full bore hysteria gripping the "ex-gay" proponents as they seek to thwart a law that would largely shut them down in the nation's most populous state and perhaps trigger similar laws in other states.  Here are excerpts:

Now that California's Senate bill 1172 has passed the judiciary committee, it now goes to vote in front of the full Senate. The bill, introduced by Sen. Ted W. Lieu, would be first in nation to regulate so-called conversion therapy. Lieu called the bill a "patient-protection plan," wrote on his own website, that the bill will "help raise public awareness of bogus and unethical therapies by mental-health providers who promise to help change a person’s sexual orientation."

The bill will ban children under 18 from being subjected to ex-gay, conversion, or reparitive therapy treatments and would require adults who seek those treatments to sign a consent form indicating that they understand that the therapy has no proven medical basis and that there are potential dangers of reparitive therapy (including raised risk of suicide and depression).

“Under the guise of a California license, some therapists are taking advantage of vulnerable people by pushing dangerous sexual orientation-change efforts,” said Lieu. “These bogus efforts have led in some cases to patients later committing suicide, as well as severe mental and physical anguish. This is junk science and it must stop. Being lesbian or gay is not a disease or mental disorder for the same reason that being a heterosexual is not a disease or a mental disorder. The medical community is unanimous in stating that homosexuality is not a medical condition.”

Anti-gay religious leaders including NARTH and Family Research Council have come out full force urging state legislators to vote against the bill when the Senate takes it to vote.

I know those who have undergone "ex-gay" therapy and there is no doubt in my mind that it seriously f*cked them up.  One has become an alcoholic over is inability to "change," another suffers from serious emotional issues, and I  know of at least one young man who committed suicide.  In my book, anyone advocating "ex-gay" therapy is an outright liar and, if they claim to be "ex-gay" themselves, they are seriously delusional and/or "ex-gay for pay" since most ex-gays strike me as being losers who have stumbled upon an easy way to make a buck and care nothing about the damage they do to others.

California Senate Bill Aims to Limit "Ex-Gay" Therapy

In a move that ought to be emulated in legislatures all around the country - assuming that legislators such as those in the Virginia GOP truly desire to protect citizens from fraudulent and potentially extremely harmful treatments - a bill (which can be found here) has been introduced in the California that aims to (i) ban reparative therapy, a/k/a "ex-gay" therapy for individuals under the age of 18 years, and (ii) require that all reparative therapy participants be required to sign an informed consent containing a strong disclaimer.   I can already hear "Marcia" Bachman shrieking in his falsetto voice already!  Ditto for PFOX mouth piece Greg Quinlain and the snake oil merchants at NARTH.  And let's not leave out porcine blowhard Cardinal Timothy Dolan who will no doubt claim that this very necessary bill is a threat to "religious liberty."  Here are highlights from Think Progress:

A California Senate committee today advanced SB 1172, a bill that would help protect citizens from harmful, ineffective ex-gay therapy. The law does not outright ban all ex-gay therapy, but it does prohibit anyone under the age of 18 from undergoing sexual orientation change efforts. It also requires that any prospective patient sign an informed consent form that includes the following disclaimer:

Having a lesbian, gay, or bisexual sexual orientation is not a mental disorder. There is no scientific evidence that any types of therapies are effective in changing a person’s sexual orientation. Sexual orientation change efforts can be harmful. The risks include, but are not limited to, depression, anxiety, and self-destructive behavior.

Medical and mental health associations that oppose the use of sexual orientation change efforts include the American Medical Association, the American Psychological Association, the American Psychiatric Association, the National Association of Social Workers, the American Counseling Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and the American Association for Marriage and Family Therapy.

This is model legislation that applies scientific knowledge to the benefit of the general welfare. Ex-gay therapy has been debunked repeatedly and deserves the marginalization that this bill would implement.

The intention behind the therapy, as essentially admitted in NARTH’s alert email today, is to simply reinforce religious bias against homosexuality. (The same email also mistakenly described the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Ted Lieu (D), as openly gay, in an apparent attempt to further bias the group’s followers.) SB 1172 is an important step forward to protect gay youth and limit the dangerous impact of such stigma.

The sooner that reparative therapy is banned nationwide and its proponents lose their licenses the better for everyone.   States routinely curtail and ban fraudulent marketing and products and that's precisely how one can best describe reparative therapy.

A Schism at Exodus International?

The "ex-gay" crowd are facing more and more legitimate scientific evidence that their claims that gays can "change" is little more than self-serving horse shit.  Why self-serving?  Because it gives "ex-gays for pay" a career they'd otherwise be without, it provides snake oil merchants with a source of income, and it provides a tool to Christofascists who seek to dupe elected officials with the "choice myth" in order to oppose LGBT equality under the civil laws.  The most recent blow to the "ex-gay" cause was Robert Sptizer's retraction of his 2003 research that supported the theory that at least a small percentage of reparative therapy participants might actually be able change their sexual orientation.  Sensing the drift of where the science is going, Exodus International president Alan Chambers has modified his claims concerning "change."  This has caused a shit storm with some within the fraudulent "ex-gay" industry as Warren Throckmorton notes.  Here are some highlights:

Apparently, Exodus President Alan Chambers’ recent comments about change of sexual orientation have not been well received by some Exodus ministry leaders. Earlier today, Andy Comiskey posted a link on his website which called for changes at Exodus in light of his disagreements with the Exodus President.

The controversy relates to Mr. Chambers recent statements that “99.9% [of people who have tried] have not experienced a change in their orientation.”

Comiskey’s newsletter comes just days after Robert Spitzer retracted his 2003 paper on change efforts. If anything, Chambers seems to be articulating a stance more in line with where many researchers are moving, without changing his basic theological position. Perhaps, it is inevitable that tension will come between those who continue to promote change and those see Exodus as a support group for same-sex attracted evangelicals. 

I have long argued that these programs need to be shut down for being both fraudulent and dangerous.  Sadly, some in the Christianist set care nothing about the harm that these programs do to participants.  Having known individuals who went through these programs, all the did was truly damage them emotionally.

National Organization for Marriage Is Now Pushing Paul Cameron's Discredited "Research"

If there were not already enough reasons to despise the National Organization for Marriage ("NOM"), now, in its rapid morphing into a full fledged anti-gay hate group, the organization is pushing the long discredited "research" of Paul Cameron. For those not in the know, Cameron was thrown out of every legitimate mental health and counseling association to which he belonged almost 30 years ago because he had falsified studies, distorted the work of others, and published outright lies. In one federal court case in which Cameron was a witness, the court in its opinion specifically called Cameron's testimony fraudulent. Yet Cameron is NOM's new "expert" of choice as it expands from "protecting marriage" to outright slandering and denigrating LGBT individuals. As noted before, I hope we soon find out who is backing NOM financially so that these new lies can be tied around the necks of these merchants of hate. Alvin McEwen has a good piece that looks at NOM's new low. Once again, the dishonesty of the "godly Christian" set is breath taking. Here are highlights:

You all knew that this would happen sooner or later. From Equality Matters:

Earlier today, Equality Matters reported that the National Organization for Marriage’s (NOM) Ruth Institute was endorsing a book that claimed, among other things, that gay parents are more likely to molest their own children than heterosexual parents.

Now, NOM appears to be doubling down on that claim – and this time on its main blog. In a December 8 blog post, NOM promoted an essay posted on the “Bad Catholic” blog titled “Two Lesbians Raised a Baby and This Is What They Got...” The essay – written by blogger Marc Barnes – is a response to a video of an Iowa man speaking eloquently in defense of his two moms, which recently went viral. Referring to the video as “false advertising,” Barnes attempts to lay out the case for why gays and lesbians aren’t fit to raise children:

Gay couples are less likely to stay together
Gay couples don’t want to get married
Gay relationships are more likely to be violent/abusive

Near the end of his essay, Barnes makes an argument which is apparently becoming NOM-dogma – gay parents molest their children at higher rates than heterosexual parents:

Similarly, the children of homosexual parents are much more likely to be sexually abused. The journal Adolescence reports that a “disproportionate percentage—29 percent—of the adult children of homosexual parents had been specifically subjected to sexual molestation by that homosexual parent, compared to only 0.6 percent of adult children of heterosexual parents having reported sexual relations with their parent…. Having a homosexual parent(s) appears to increase the risk of incest with a parent by a factor of about 50″ (P. Cameron and K. Cameron, “Homosexual Parents,” Adolescence 31 (1996): 772.).

That's right. Barnes - and NOM, since it is featuring Barnes' piece - is now pushing the work of the discredited Paul "gay stuff gerbils up their rectums" Cameron.

For those who are not in the know (and those who are regular readers of this blog really should be in the know), he is the man who, in the 1980s, came up with the idea of aggressively using science to prove that homosexuality is a "dangerous lifestyle." The problem is to do this, Cameron attained a reputation for either distorting legitimate science or distorting his own work to gain the conclusions he wanted from his "studies." He has also been discredited and censured by many group and individuals on the left, the right, and in the middle due to his bad research techniques.

[T]he Southern Poverty Law declared Cameron's group, the Family Research Institute, to be an anti-gay hate group. Cameron has been rebuked by many legitimate sources:

“(Cameron) misrepresents my findings and distorts them to advance his homophobic views. I make a very clear distinction in my writing between pedophilia and homosexuality, noting that adult males who sexually victimize young boys are either pedophilic or heterosexual, and that in my research I have not found homosexual men turning away from adult partners to children . . . I consider this totally unprofessional behavior on the part of Dr. Cameron and I want to bring this to your attention. He disgraces his profession.” - Dr. A. Nicholas Groth in 1984 after discovering that Cameron distorted his work.

"Paul Cameron (Nebraska) was dropped from membership for a violation of the Preamble to the Ethical Principles of Psychologists - American Psychological Association, 1983

The science and profession of psychology in Nebraska as represented by the Nebraska Psychological Association, formally dissociates itself from the representations and interpretations of scientific literature offered by Dr. Paul Cameron in his writings and public statements on sexuality. Further, the Nebraska Psychological Association would like it known that Dr. Cameron is not a member of the Association. Dr. Cameron was recently dropped from membership in the American Psychological Association for a violation of the Preamble to the Ethical Principles of Psychologists - Nebraska Psychological Association, 1984

Dr. Paul Cameron has consistently misinterpreted and misrepresented sociological research on sexuality, homosexuality, and lesbianism" - American Sociological Association, 1985

The Canadian Psychological Association takes the position that Dr. Paul Cameron has consistently misinterpreted and misrepresented research on sexuality, homosexuality, and lesbianism and thus, it formally disassociates itself from the representation and interpretations of scientific literature in his writings and public statements on sexuality. - Canadian Psychological Association, 1996

NOM's decision to push Cameron's work - through nasty proxy - is significant because it proves something the lgbtq community and our allies have always known. NOM has never been interested in protect marriage. NOM's only goal is to demonize gays. The next time Maggie Gallagher whines about how her organization is being unfairly called "bigoted," just remind her of this little incident.

By pushing Cameron's long discredited work, Maggie Gallagher and her cohorts at NOM truly make tawdry prostitutes look virtuous in comparison. At least the prostitutes are honest.

More Lies and False Claims of Death Treats from PFOX

For those unfamiliar with PFOX - a/k/a Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays - the organization is basically an anti-gay front organization funded historically by a who's who of anti-gay organizations. I often use the term "ex-gay for pay" on this blog and it certainly applies to the "ex-gays" at PFOX who will happily lie not only to themselves but anyone they can get to listen to them in exchange for a pay check and/or a front that gives them some semblance of respectability amongst the Kool-Aid drinking followers of Christianist set and far right extremist who desperately want to maintain the myth that sexual orientation can change for political reasons among others. Truth and veracity and PFOX are generally mutually exclusive and PFOX's current president Greg Quinlan takes the untruths to new levels and accuses legitimate researchers of falsifying or lying about their research.

In fact, Quinlan has gone even further and alleged in television interview that Wayne Besen of Truth Wins Out who I've known for over 8 years and have worked with a number of times (e.g., we collaborated to expose national level "ex-gay" poster boy Michael Johnston as a fraud and dug up the information to expose Arthur Abba Goldberg, the head of JONAH, a/k/a Jews Offering New Alternatives to Homosexuality and a board member of NARTH to be a disbarred attorney and convicted felon- he was part of a multi-billion dollar fraudulent securities offering). Wayne is considering a lawsuit against PFOX (which is conveniently based in tiny Reedville, Virginia) and Quinlan. I'd be more than happy to be local counsel. Here are highlights from Ex-Gay Watch's coverage of Quinlan's blatant lies:

Current PFOX president Greg Quinlan appeared for an interview recently on a local D.C. station. While the interviewer, Mark Segraves (WDCW-TV), was better prepared than most, it doesn’t seem he understood the depth of misinformation Quinlan is willing to put forth. It would take a week to tease through the factual errors in this short interview, and much of it has been covered before. For example, claims that PFOX won a suit in D.C to have ex-gays considered a protected class have been confronted before.

Quinlan goes on to accuse noted geneticist Dean Hamer of lying about his research, Dr. Robert Spitzer of not knowing what his own research says on the possibility of sexual orientation change, and claims that AIDS is a “homosexual disease.” This is not the first time Quinlan has been accused of distorting a researchers work.

Most astounding were Quinlan’s claims that Truth Wins Out director Wayne Besen wanted someone to run him over with a bus, or inject him with AIDS:

Truth Wins Out if you look further, including Wayne Besen. He’s asked for people, you know, somebody needs to run Greg over. He needs to be hit with a bus. Somebody should inject him with AIDS. Those are the things that Wayne Besen and Truth Wins Out says about me. That’s pretty hateful rhetoric.

These are serious allegations and demand a solid source for confirmation. For the record, Besen denies ever making the comments and we join him in challenging Quinlan to produce evidence of this claim. It’s worth reviewing the video in full just to see how fast and lose Quinlan plays with the truth.

As is the norm for PFOX, it's the one that spreads hateful rhetoric not to mention deliberate untruths. Grove City College professor and licensed therapist Warren Throckmorton also gets into the act of underscoring Quinlan's dishonesty:

Really? Besen has said some critical and dismissive things about ex-gays but I’ve never heard anything like that. Quinlan may soon have to provide proof of that since Besen absolutely denies the charges and may sue for defamation.

There are other questionable aspects to Quinlan’s claims. In the interview, Quinlan says that both APAs say that sexuality is fluid (not really, they say identity can shift but that orientation is pretty fixed). He says he is not paid to be ex-gay (sorry, I know the history there, his reputation is founded on his status as an ex-gay). He says that is acceptable for him to refer to gays as “faggots” because it is acceptable for blacks to use the “N” word referring to themselves (I’ll let readers ponder that one).

When confronted with the fact that Richard Cohen was expelled from the American Counseling Association, Quinlan said at 11:40, “But he hasn’t lost his license.” To my knowledge, Richard never had a license and he certainly does not now. Then he told Sagraves that Richard has a 90% success rate helping people change. If Richard claims that, I have never seen it.

Frankly, nothing would be more enjoyable that seeing a lawsuit go forward against PFOX and Quinlan. The thought of Quinlan in depositions with potential perjury charges hanging over his head almost makes my giddy. Add to that the discovery process in general that would force PFOX to produce documents and answer interrogatories in writing, and it could be a death knell for PFOX. I'm very confident that there is ZERO legitimate research or documentation to back up any of Quinlan's outrageous statements.

French Protest American Ex-Gay Program

I've noted many times in the past the efforts of the American Christian Taliban to export the ex-gay myth overseas, particularly to largely uneducated populations in Africa. But the effort is not limited to third world nations. Even countries like France are seeing the effort to import lies and false "experts" in order to denigrate gays and promote the myth that sexual orientation is changeable. Fortunately, the Christianist efforts are meeting with considerable opposition and outcry as recently demonstrated in Toulouse, France. Jim Burroway at Box Turtle Bulletin has details. Here are highlights:

Organizers of Rainbow Toulouse had hoped that maybe a hundred people at the most might to show up in front of a small Evangelical church to protest a planned ex-gay seminar. Instead, they were pleasantly surprised to see between 200 and 300 protesters turning out.

The scheduled seminar, scheduled for last weekend, is affiliated with Andrew Comiskey’s Living Waters program in the U.S. Comiskey, a former president of Exodus International, has been aggressively expanding his Desert Stream Ministries and its Living Waters program in Canada and Europe. Former ex-gay leader Vonnie Pits issued an apology for her role in a Living Waters-based program she set up in New South Wales, Australia.

In 2005, DSM moved to Kansas City where Comiskey announced he was partnering with Dominionist theologian Mike Bickle (organizer of Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s crusade in Houston) and the International House of Prayer. DSM reportedly uses “extreme methods that involve forms of exorcism (deliverance/healing prayer) and rely on teachings that believe that people become gay through demonic influences and the sins of ancestors.”

You can see a video testimony of an ex-gay survivor of Living Waters here.

These "ex-gay" ministries and the quacks who make a comfortable living peddling lies need to be shut down. State regulators need to start revoking licenses and/or instituting prosecution against the quacks who are knowingly defrauding the desperate and vulnerable.

Ricky Martin Granted Spanish Citizenship

It's sad when Americans have to seek citizenship in other nations in order to have full civil legal rights. Yet that appears what Singer Ricky Martin has done in order to legally marry his partner. I can fully understand the feeling and have not infrequently pondered leaving the USA since I am not a full citizen in America. Indeed, in Virginia, I'm not even a 2nd class citizen given Virginia's virulently anti-gay legal climate. As I have less than jokingly noted before, pet owners have far more legal recognition afforded to their relationships with their pets than same sex couples do with their partners even if they have been together for many decades. The United States is truly falsely advertised as a nation of equality and a nation offering freedom from religious persecution. But back to Ricky Martin. It seems that the Spanish government has sought to help the performer realize his dream of a legal marriage. Even though because of DOMA it will be treated as a nonentity. Here are some highlights from Pink News:

Puerto Rican pop singer Ricky Martin was given Spanish citizenship today, the country’s government said. The star, who came out in 2009 reportedly wants to take advantage of Spain’s gay marriage laws.

Spokesman Jose Blanco told a news conference that ministers had agreed to grant him a “letter of naturalization”, issued in special circumstances, because of his “personal and professional links with Spain”.

Spanish newspaper El Pais reported that Martin sought citizenship in order to marry boyfriend Carlos Gonzalez Abella, with whom he is bringing up his twin three-year-old sons.

Appearing on the Larry King show last year, he had said: “I would get married… There are many countries around the world where same-sex marriage is a right. Not in Puerto Rico, unfortunately. And not in many states in America.

“Yes, we could go to Spain and get married. We can go to Argentina and get married. But why do we have to go somewhere else? Why can’t I do it in my country where the laws are – you know, protecting me?”

He added: “I can go to Spain. I have many friends in Spain. And get married. And make it very beautiful and symbolic. But… I [can't] do it in the backyard of my house. I want to have that option. I don’t want to be a second class citizen anymore. I pay my taxes. Why can’t I have that right?”

Second class citizen gets old especially when the only true justification for it is so that nasty bigots can feel better about themselves and feel free to look down on others whether it be to feel a sense of power, privilege, or ignore the fact that in truth they are the ones who are morally inferior. Were circumstances different, I would never have returned to the USA after our recent trip to Europe.

Marco Rubio's Fictional Family History

It seems the typical GOP politician is either a closeted gay, a religious fanatic or someone who invents a more dazzling self-history to dupe the gullible. A case in point for the latter phenomenon is Florida Senator Marco Rubio who fabricated a compelling family story to promote his political future. The only problem is that now the story has been shown to be totally false. It's one thing to modestly enhance one's biography. It's something far different to totally make it up. Yet that's what Rubio apparently did in part to cater to Cuban-American voters in Florida. The question obviously arises as to what elese Rubio has lied about in the course of his self-promotion. The Washington Post has details - here are some highlights.

During his rise to political prominence, Sen. Marco Rubio frequently repeated a compelling version of his family’s history that had special resonance in South Florida. He was the “son of exiles,” he told audiences, Cuban Americans forced off their beloved island after “a thug,” Fidel Castro, took power.

But a review of documents — including naturalization papers and other official records — reveals that the Florida Republican’s account embellishes the facts. The documents show that Rubio’s parents came to the United States and were admitted for permanent residence more than two-and-a-halfyears before Castro’s forces overthrew the Cuban government and took power on New Year’s Day 1959.

The supposed flight of Rubio’s parents has been at the core of the young senator’s political identity, both before and after his stunning tea-party-propelled victory in last year’s Senate election.

And the 40-year-old senator with the boyish smile and prom-king good looks has drawn on the power of that claim to entrance audiences captivated by the rhetorical skills of one of the more dynamic stump speakers in modern American politics.

The real story of his parents’ migration appears to be a more conventional immigrant narrative, a couple who came to the United States seeking a better life. In the year they arrived in Florida, the future Marxist dictator was in Mexico plotting a quixotic return to Cuba.

The senator’s office tried to clarify the facts in its statement Thursday. . . . legal scholars on both sides of the McCain debate told The Post that Rubio’s citizenship does not appear to be an issue.

Apple Appears to have Pulled Exodus iPhone Application

UPDATED: As the tweet above confirms, Apple apparently decided being in bed with an anti-gay propaganda affiliate of the Christian Right that pushes therapies condemned by the American Psychological Association and other legitimate mental health and medical experts was bad for business.

No company announcement seems to have been released, but it looks as if Apple has realized it made a huge mistake getting involved with Exodus International - an organization that attempts to "cure" gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people. The move may have been triggered by the fact that more than 144,000 people have reportedly signed a petition started by Truth Wins Out demanding that Apple remove the offensive iPhone app launched by Exodus International. As Wayne Besen noted, "This is not a question of free speech, but stopping a virulently anti-gay organization from peddling false speech at the expense of vulnerable LGBT youth."

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As more details are available, this post will be updated.

Christian Dominionist Wants Government Regulation of Gay Sex

A rash of gay teen suicides and what do the Christianists do? They go into overdrive with gay bashing and disseminating the tired lies that set the stage for the suicides in the first place. The latest gay bashing bigot to exhibit diarrhea of the mouth is Christian Dominionist David Barton of Wallbuilders. For the record, Christian Dominionist want to overthrow the U.S. Constitution and in its place institute a Bible based theocracy. That's right, they basically want to commit treason and overthrow the government. In putting forth his batshitery, Barton - in addition to a selective reading of the Bible - recites the same discredited and fraudulent anti-gay propaganda put out by Paul Cameron. The same Paul Cameron who was thrown out of every legitimate medical and mental health related association he belonged to over 25 years ago. Barton proves yet again that when a far right Christian's lips are moving , the odds are that he/she is lying. Right Wing Watch has details. Here are some highlights:
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Barton: We have a Department of Health and Human Services; we have health care bills; we have health insurance and we’re trying to stop all unhealthy things . . . to tell you how to live a healthy lifestyle. So if I got to the Centers for Disease Control and I’m concerned about health, I find some interesting stats there and this should tell me something about health.
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Homosexual/bi-sexual individuals are seven times more likely to contemplate or commit suicide. Oooh, that doesn’t sound very healthy.
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Homosexuals die decades earlier than heterosexuals. That doesn’t sound healthy.
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Nearly one-half of practicing homosexuals admit to five hundred or more sex partners and nearly one-third admit to a thousand or more sex partners in a lifetime.
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I mean, you go through all this stuff, sounds to me like that’s not very healthy. Why don’t we regulate homosexuality?
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there was a study done back in the 1920s and it looked at eighty-some odd nations and those rejected sexual regulation like with homosexuality, none of them lasted past the third generation from the time that they embraced it. So how ever many it looked at …
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As more and more studies are confirming, the higher gay suicide rate tracks to the vile lies and persecution that gays face due to people like Barton. This diatribe is yet another example of the persecutor blaming the victim. Barton and those like him are a clear and present danger to both civil law under the Constitution and the freedom of religion that the Constitution promises to others.

Top Cuccinelli Contributor Under Investigation for Fraudulent Charity Scheme

I keep waiting for Virginia's resident loon, Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, a/ka/ Kookinelli, to do something to result in his being forced from office. I mean, one can always hope, right? In addition to so far unsubstantiated rumors that Cuccinelli has possible played for our team in his past, now Kookinelli's second largest campaign contributor is under investigation for possible fundraising fraud for a "charity" that may or may not even exist.

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Talking Points Memo has a lengthy article that looks at the probes now ongoing in several states involving Cooch's campaign contributor crony, Bobby Thompson, and his alleged charity, the U.S. Navy Veterans Association (USNVA), which says it offers assistance to navy veterans. The only problem is that most of the facts put out about the alleged charity are not true. Obviously, with Hampton Roads' huge military veteran population, should it turn out that Thompson was bilking unwitting donors and passing the cash onto Kookinelli, it will not help Kookinelli's delusions of grandeur. Obviously, to see Kookinelli get dragged into the possible shady deal would be ever so sweet. Here are highlights from TPM (the St. Petersburg Times has much more here):

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[T]he full story of what happened in Virginia suggests how easily one state government may have been taken in by a noble-sounding cause and a some well-timed campaign contributions. In 2009, Thompson gave $55,000 to Cuccinelli, making him the second largest individual contributor to the future AG, according to the St. Petersburg Times*. A $50,000 contribution came after Cuccinelli directly solicited him by phone last August.
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So just what did the St. Petersburg Times discover? It's worth reading the full series yourself to get the complete picture, but here are some details:

• USNVA says in IRS filings that it consists of 85 volunteer officers, over 66,000 members, and 41 state chapters. But the paper searched long and hard for all 85 officers, and could find no record whatsoever for 84 of them. Among that group was the man listed on USNVA's rudimentary-looking website as its CEO, Jack L. Nimitz, whose bio says he's a lifelong Texas resident, retired naval reservist and now private investment banker.

• USNVA also says a five-member executive board and 12 key officers work out of the group's national headquarters on M Street in Washington, D.C. But that address turns out to be a mailbox at a UPS shipping store.

• The paper reports: "In the end, the searches for people and documents all came back to one man, the association's director of development, Bobby Thompson, and one place, his $1,200-a-month rented duplex across from the Cuesta-Rey cigar factory in Ybor City ... After the Times started asking questions ... Thompson, who had lived in the duplex for a decade, cleared out. His landlord said he left no forwarding address."

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Nor could the paper find any evidence for the existence of either of the two auditors who USVNA says have conducted audits of its finances.

• The paper adds: "The group reported $4.58 million in income from its Florida chapter in 2008 and $17.82 million from its other chapters. It said it donated about 1 percent to needy beneficiaries and said the other 99 percent went for administrative costs, educational materials and "direct assistance'' to veterans and their families." USNVA told the Times it had "tens of thousands" of records detailing its expenditures, but declined to make them available. It has accused the paper of conducting "McCarthy-like witch hunts" against it.
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You get the picture. The paper has reported that authorities in New Mexico, Florida, and Missouri are now investigating USNVA, and New Mexico has suspended fundraising by the group.
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[C]ome July, when USNVA may begin soliciting Virginians for contributions, it seems to us that there would be ample evidence for the AG to use his own office to start looking into the man who provided almost 3 percent of his total campaign haul last year. Cuccinelli could even free up some resources by easing off on the investigation of climate science he's currently focused on. So, Mr. Attorney General, how about it?

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Alas, it seems it is always the self-declared "family value" conservatives who are in fact the crooks and use religion and patriotism to fleece the sheeple. It's most appropriate that Kookinelli is involved with such a possible crook. Oh, and Bob McDonnell recieved $5,000 from Thompson.

Latest Revenue Figures for Anti-Gay Industry

One of the big lies - there are so many it's hard to keep track at times - routinely peddled by the Christianist organizations is that the "militant homosexual activists" are better funded than the poor, pathetic outgunned Christianist organizations. It's a scam, of course, utilized to scare little old ladies and severe self-hating closet cases to send in their checks or make their online donations so that James Dobson and those like him can live high on the hog. The truth is that all of the gay rights organizations combined operate on a shoe string budget compared to the combined funding of the Christianist organizations which is truly massive. Tips-Q has an interesting report that shows just how big this Christianist lie is based on the latest reports compiled from IRS filings. Here are a few highlights on some of the most homophobic organizations:

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Focus on the Family - 2007 revenues - $147,182,000.

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Coral Ridge Ministries - 2004 revenues - $39,688,000.

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Alliance Defense Fund - 2007 revenues - $31,674,000.

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American Family Association - 2007 revenues - $22,547,000.

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Family Research Council, Inc. - 2007 revenues - $12,057,000.

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Concerned Women for America - 2007 revenues - $10,640,000.

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Traditional Values Coalition - 2007 revenues - $8,547,000.

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Suffice it to say, I suspect you get the real picture and will have an appreciation as to how much money the anti-gay industry takes in by demonizing us and trying to depict us as less than fully human. It's disgusting to say the least.

Media Military Analysts Gave Biased Reports

Personally, I am not the least bit surprised to find - as disclosed in this New York Times article - that the Chimperator's regime and the Pentagon gave mainstream media millitary analysts (who often are NOT disinerested parties) false information so that the media helped sell Chimpy and Cheney's lies. Let's face it, when the Chimperator and Cheney are talking (the same goes for their subordinantes) the safest assumption to be made is that they are lying. I hate to say it, but I believe that is the true bottom line.

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In some ways the bigger surprise is that it took the mainstream media so long to figure out that it was played for a fool and was utilized as a principal means of disseminating false information. No analyst is unbiased if he/she works for military contractors who are in bed with the Pentagon. As such, the mainstream media needs to rethink who is employed as a "military analyst" to insure that an objective view will be provided. Otherwise, the media is acting much like the German press under Hitler or the former communist regimes. It is a truly sad state of affairs. Here are some story highlights:

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To the public, these men are members of a familiar fraternity, presented tens of thousands of times on television and radio as “military analysts” whose long service has equipped them to give authoritative and unfettered judgments about the most pressing issues of the post-Sept. 11 world. Hidden behind that appearance of objectivity, though, is a Pentagon information apparatus that has used those analysts in a campaign to generate favorable news coverage of the administration’s wartime performance, an examination by The New York Times has found.

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The effort, which began with the buildup to the Iraq war and continues to this day, has sought to exploit ideological and military allegiances, and also a powerful financial dynamic: Most of the analysts have ties to military contractors vested in the very war policies they are asked to assess on air. Those business relationships are hardly ever disclosed to the viewers, and sometimes not even to the networks themselves. But collectively, the men on the plane and several dozen other military analysts represent more than 150 military contractors either as lobbyists, senior executives, board members or consultants.

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Records and interviews show how the Bush administration has used its control over access and information in an effort to transform the analysts into a kind of media Trojan horse — an instrument intended to shape terrorism coverage from inside the major TV and radio networks.

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In turn, members of this group have echoed administration talking points, sometimes even when they suspected the information was false or inflated. Some analysts acknowledge they suppressed doubts because they feared jeopardizing their access. A few expressed regret for participating in what they regarded as an effort to dupe the American public with propaganda dressed as independent military analysis. Analysts have been wooed in hundreds of private briefings with senior military leaders, including officials with significant influence over contracting and budget matters, records show.

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Five years into the Iraq war, most details of the architecture and execution of the Pentagon’s campaign have never been disclosed. But The Times successfully sued the Defense Department to gain access to 8,000 pages of e-mail messages, transcripts and records describing years of private briefings, trips to Iraq and Guantánamo and an extensive Pentagon talking points operation. These records reveal a symbiotic relationship where the usual dividing lines between government and journalism have been obliterated. Internal Pentagon documents repeatedly refer to the military analysts as “message force multipliers” or “surrogates” who could be counted on to deliver administration “themes and messages” to millions of Americans “in the form of their own opinions.”

Canadian Ex-gay Therapist Convicted on Sexual Assault

Anyone who has read this blog for a while knows that I am very much against reparative therapy and the bogus claims that gays can “change” their sexual orientation. Having tried myself for 37 years, I know the claims are utter bull shit. If I had my way, all of these quack programs would be shut down. Thus, except for what happened to the victim, I find it hilarious that a minister and former Christian college instructor has been found guilty of sexually assaulting a young man who sought counseling after he feared he was homosexual. It seems that the therapist wasn’t all too cured himself. My friend Wayne Besen, author of Anything But Straight, Unmasking the Scandals and Lies Behind the Ex-gay Myth (http://www.anythingbutstraight.com/index.html) should love this story! Here are some highlights from last Thursday's Winnipeg Sun (http://www.winnipegsun.com/News/Winnipeg/2008/02/14/pf-4847839.html):

Crown attorney Dale Schille said the evidence against Lewis was “overwhelming” and he never denied the allegations in a statement to police. In earlier testimony, the alleged victim, now 29, told court he started meeting Lewis for counseling sessions in early 2000 after his parents caught him viewing gay pornography on the family computer. Lewis — a family friend and minister — confided he had his own sexual identity issues and the two embarked on weekly counseling sessions designed to “assist me to be straight and to live a straight life,” the man said.

The man said Lewis started a program of “touch therapy,” which included the two kissing and fondling each other and engaging in sexual role playing. “He said I was to tell no one about it because no one would understand,” the man testified. During “touch therapy” sessions in Lewis’ car, Lewis asked him to masturbate, the man said. Lewis also admitted to fantasizing about him, the man said.

A jury returned with the guilty verdict early last night after only a few hours of deliberations. Terrance Lewis, 60, will be sentenced at a later date.

Top Six Religious Right (anti-gay industry) Distortion Techniques

Having worked for a number of years in the effort to expose the lies and deceit used by the “Christian” Right organizations to demonize and de-humanizes gays, I have seen all kinds of deliberate efforts utilized by these groups (e.g., Focus on the Family, American Family Association, Concerned Women for America, etc.) to disseminate known lies to the larger community and to influence legislators. The sad truth is that no lie is too despicable for these people who seem to have exempted themselves from the prohibitions in the Ten Commandments against lying and bearing false witness. I even put together a position paper “The Truth About Family Values Organizations” that I gave out to some legislators that documented their fraudulent and dishonest techniques. That paper is a bit too bulking for blog posting. However, I can across a good synopsis on Anti-Gay Lies and Liars (see my blog roll) that is a useful tool in combating our enemies on the far right. Here is a portion of the synopsis:

1. Using nonrepresentative or out-of-date studies to make generalizations, or distorting legitimate studies to give misleading conclusions.

Example 1 - Anti-gay industry talking point - Same sex marriage and gay adoption are bad ideas because research shows that the best places to raise children are in homes with a mother and a father.

The truth - The research only looked at heterosexual two-parent households as opposed to single parent heterosexual households. Same-sex households were never included.

Point of fact - The following researchers have complained about how the anti-gay industry has misused their work (see Time Line below) - A. Nicholas Groth, the six researchers of a Canadian study (Robert S. Hogg, Stefan A. Strathdee, Kevin J.P. Craib, Michael V. Shaughnessy, Julio Montaner, and Martin T. Schehter), Dr. Robert Garofalo, Lisa Waldner, Patrick Letellier, Dr. Kyle Pruett, Dr. Joanne Hall, Dr. Elizabeth Saewyc, Carol Gilligan, and Dr. Robert Spitzer.

2. Repetition - Despite the fact that several physicians and researchers complain about the distortion of their work by the anti-gay industry, corrections are usually not made.

3. Conspiracy Theory - Claiming that gays and lesbians are consistently plotting to "erode traditional values."

Example - “The agenda of homosexual activists is basically to change America from what they perceive as looking down on homosexual behavior, to the affirmation of and societal acceptance of homosexual behavior. It is an agenda that they basically set in the late 1980s, in a book called After the Ball, where they laid out a six-point plan for how they could transform the beliefs of ordinary Americans with regard to homosexual behavior—in a decade-long time frame." - Craig Osten, Q&A: The Homosexual Agenda, Focus on the Family, July 25, 2003

4. Dire Consequences - Claiming that a pro-gay law or ordinance will lead to negative consequences without proof that the consequences will take place:

Example 1 - “Imagine, if you will, a 280 lb linebacker who likes to wear a dress and high heels and lipstick, you know comes to church wanting a job at the front desk as a receptionist and they turn him away because they don’t feel that that represents their values or the image that they’re trying to hold at that church, under ENDA they could be held accountable fordiscrimination against that individual.” - Matt Barber, Concerned Women for America, 2007

Example 2 - “H.R. 254 elevates one group of Americans above others, creating a special class of victims. All things being equal, it means that if a 5-foot-2-inch grandmother is violently attacked on the street, she is less worthy of justice than the 6-foot-4-inch homosexual man who is attacked by the same assailant.” - Matt Barber, Concerned Women for America, 2007

5. Phony Experts - Creating their own "experts" on the gay and lesbian community.

6. Dehumanizing Semantics - Consistently using language (i.e. demonstrative verbs and adjectives) in their talking points, sound bites, and press releases to make gays and lesbians seem like impersonal, threatening outsiders

Example 1 - “But unfortunately, the evangelist observes, many Christians have been bullied into submission on the aggressive homosexual agenda in public schools.”—Evangelist Proposes to Combat Homosexual Agenda in Public Education, Agape Press, May 11, 2005

Example 2 - “Elsewhere in the battle against the homosexual agenda, the Broward County School Board in Florida has voted to allow a pro- homosexual group to indoctrinate its teachers on tolerance.”— Children Adopted by Homosexuals Suffer, Family Advocate Says, Agape Press, April 25, 2002

Example 3 - “The ACLU continues to use a law license to bully school districts and harass parents in order to brainwash their kids abut the ‘normalcy’ of homosexuality.”—Jan LaRue, ACLU Seeks Mandatory Homosexual Sensitivity Training, Concerned Women for America press release, July 14, 2005