George Alan Rekers has a distinguished history in the LGBT community. A colorful record as lively and prudent as felon Scott Lively himself.
While it is colorful, it is anything from bright and cheery. Rekers, a very outspoken and proud Baptist minister, who is a discredited psychologist, has published many papers and two books on what he feels homosexuality and gender identity is and what it isn’t. I quote again “what he feels” because his data is anything but science.
In his one online publication Summary of Expert Opinions on How Parenting by Homosexuality-Behaving Parent Figures Affects Child Adjustment and Well-Being (PDF document), he makes several references to work used on abusive parents and single parents and then labels them as proof that same-sex couples are detriments to children. He uses a plethora of religious sources– rather than use sources from the American Psychological Association, the National Association of Social Workers, or the American Academy of Pediatrics — to come to his conclusion that children only do well, and should only be raised, by a mother and a father, and that homosexual parents are dangerous to children (Summary, page 1-2).
Rekers continues on in this paper to say that all the data and evidence that supports same sex couples are equally able to be nurturing and loving parents is false because those students only factor in to foster children, which Rekers claims to all have psychological problems, that the samples were too small and not random, and they have not been done for a long enough period of time (summary page 1). Rekers also states that homosexual couples are far less stable than heterosexual ones and that homosexual people are all psychologically damaged. He also states that same-sex couples in more tolerant cultures like the Netherlands are quite unstable because they are psychologically damaged.
These quotes are not from any mental-health associations, but from the religious University of St. Thomas Law School as his source for this data. This analysis by Rekers could not be further from scientific evidence. A multitude of studies have been done by Dr. Judith Stacey, the APA and the American Sociological Association that disprove these myths. More so Dr. John Gottman has done many studies that conclude that gay couples in the US and in places like The Netherlands are actually more stable (Gottman).
What is sad about this paper that Rekers wrote and his other works is that it repeats the same tired stereotypes about gay people being psychologically damage because they are gay. This has been disproven even by people like Dr. Evelyn Hooker back in the early Fifties. What we know now is that LGBT people face higher rates of suicide, depression and anxiety not because they are gay but because of the social oppression they face (Udavis). Despite Rekers quoting that gay parents should not be adoptive parents of any type, and they should not even be around children, he makes no mention at all of people who suffer from real psychological disorders and their ability to parent; concluding that his work is anything but unbiased. Rekers often uses religion in his work to define marriage and what a family is throughout his work but rarely takes into account what other religions outside of his own have to say on this issue (Summary, page 3).
As for being a board member to the Family Research Council, a hate group labeled by the Southern Poverty Law Center, he was involved in to court hearings as an “expert witness” for dependents of anti-gay bans on adoption in the state of Arkansas and Florida. His testimony was so outlandish that the circuit judge in Arkansas, Judge Timothy White declared Rekers testimony “extremely suspect” and “promoting his own personal agenda” (In re: Gill). The Judge Cindy Lederman declared:
“Dr. Rekers’ testimony was far from a neutral and unbiased recitation of the relevant scientific evidence. Dr. Rekers’ beliefs are motivated by his strong ideological and theological convictions that are not consistent with the science. Based on his testimony and demeanor at trial, the court can not consider his testimony to be credible nor worthy of forming the basis of public policy.” (In re: Gill trial court decision and order, PDF document, page 23.)
Within the same case Rekers stated that Native Americans were all alcoholics and should also not be adoptive parents (Gill pg. 21). Rekers concluded that a child living with his same sex parents for even a period of over ten years should be removed and that the child will adjust in only a year of being with a opposite sex family (Gill pg 21). The court docket of this case does not exacerbate when it states that people were astonished at this heavily biased, scientifically void and outlandish statement that is contrary to all childhood development studies.
Rekers’ wonderful history of working with junk science groups like NARTH and hate groups like the Family Research Council prove to be the pinnacle of his background. His work is not just questionable but its overwhelmingly false, bias, and irresponsible, going over a micrometer just to call it lavishly mean. With people like Rekers heading up the our enemies ideologies and defendants of anti-gay adoptions and marriage bans our equality seems more like a hop, skip and then a jump away from reality. Rekers, while continually claiming that LGBT people are mentally ill and unstable seems in the process of his own work to undulate that phrase enough as to question his own mental stability. Falling on the ideas of Paul Joseph Goebbels, Rekers must believe that if he tells his lie long enough and loud enough someone will eventually believe it. Even with his constant “crazy man” undulation of anti-gay rhetoric, Rekers is zero for two in the battle in the courts. It would be suffice to say that earlier retirement from his anti-gay campaign seems like a smart idea that has yet to ignite that burnt out bulb in his brain.
Sources
Shaping Your Child’s Sexual Identity. ISBN 0801077133
Growing Up Straight: What Families should Know about Homosexuality. ISBN 978-0802401564
Tags: ex-gay, George Rekers, NARTH, rent boy, reparative therapy, scandal15 Comments »
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http://www.miaminewtimes.com/2010-05-06/news/christian-right-leader-george-rekers-takes-vacation-with-rent-boy/
Comment by Lewis Camacho — May 4, 2010 @ 1:20 pm
http://www.queerty.com/the-gay-rentboy-scandal-that-should-sink-bigot-baptist-minister-george-alan-rekers-20100504/
Comment by Gay Father — May 4, 2010 @ 4:00 pm
Rekers discredited here (and defended by Mat Staver of Liberty Counsel):
From: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389×4553798
According to court records, the state of Florida paid former University of South Carolina professor George A. Rekers a $60,000 retainer to testify for the gay adoption ban.
Ironically, according to the same court documents, it is clear that Rekers’ testimony didn’t help the state’ case.
Court documents said:
Dr. Rekers’ testimony was far from a neutral and unbiased recitation of the relevant scientific evidence. Dr. Rekers’ beliefs are motivated by his strong ideological and theological convictions that are not consistent with the science. Based on his testimony and demeanor at trial, the court can not consider his testimony to be credible nor worthy of forming the basis of public policy.
Despite all of this, organizations on the right maligned Miami-Dade Circuit Court Judge Cindy Lederman for her decision, calling her an “activist judge.”
Matt Staver of the Liberty Counsel said:
“This judge is merely an ideological activist, and ideological activists have no reason to don a black robe and sit behind a bench and pontificate. This judge’s decision should be overturned, and moreover, this judge should be voted out of office.”
Moreover, comments on right-wing sites such as One News Now and Free Republic questioned not only Lederman’ objectivity, but her sexual orientation in lurid terms.
The American Civil Liberties Union, in an excerpt of proposed findings to the court, criticized the state of Florida for using Rekers as an expert witness even after he had been discredited in a similar Arkansas case involving gay adoption.
In 2005, Pulaski County Circuit Judge Timothy White ruled that the state did not have justifiable grounds to keep gays from adopting children.
The Arkansas court specifically said that “Dr. Rekers’ willingness to prioritize his personal beliefs over his functions as an expert provider of fact rendered his testimony extremely suspect and little, if any, assistance to the court” and “Dr. Rekers’ personal agenda caused him to have inconsistent testimony on several issues.”
That ruling led to a ballot initiative that was passed in November barring unmarried heterosexual and gay couples from adopting children.
Comment by Christine — May 4, 2010 @ 4:18 pm
Rekers is morally and intellectually bankrupt. However, he didn’t anything in the case about not allowing adoption by Native Americans. Someone else used that to illustrate what’s wrong with his argument about homosexuals. “By your argument,” they’re saying, “you shouldn’t allow Native Americans to adopt, since as a group they also have higher rates of depression and substance abuse.”
Rekers’s own life and opinions are damning enough, we don’t have to add to the pile. :-)
Comment by Eric — May 4, 2010 @ 7:56 pm
Eric,I am the original author of the piece which was linked on Democratic Underground and I stand by that piece.
This is from the Miami Herald article:
Gay men and lesbians have two to four times the likelihood of suffering from major depression, anxiety or substance abuse, based on several national studies, Rekers testified. Gay men, he said, are four times more likely than straight men to attempt suicide.
Depressed people, Rekers said, ”are less consistent in their parenting, less positive [and] have higher rates of neglecting child needs.” Gay people, he added, “would have less capability of providing the kind of nurturing and secure emotional environment for children.”
. . . Rekers said he would, in fact, favor banning anyone from adopting who had more than 18 ”sex partners” during a lifetime. ”I think that would be a very good social policy,” he said in a deposition.
He said he would also consider banning Native Americans from adopting because research shows that they are also at much higher risk of mental illness and substance abuse. ”They would tend to hang around each other,” Rekers testified. “So the children would be around a lot of other Native Americans who are . . . doing the same sorts of things.”
Comment by a. mcewen — May 4, 2010 @ 10:37 pm
Here is a better link to his statement:
http://miamiherald.typepad.com/gaysouthflorida/2010/05/equality-florida-new-times-reports-attorney-general-bill-mccollums-expert-witness-in-adoption-case-caught-with-male-prostit.html
Comment by a. mcewen — May 4, 2010 @ 10:39 pm
[...] Truth Wins Out has an excellent breakdown of the background of George Rekers and why this story is highly important to those who care about [...]
Pingback by Alvin McEwen: Anti-gay organization founder travels with a "rentboy‚Äô | Best Breaking News — May 4, 2010 @ 11:39 pm
A. McEwen, my apologies. I am appalled. I assumed that the statement was (incorrectly) inferred from the Gill case. The PDF does not include that claim, only the reductio I referred to. The quotation in the article you linked to is clear. There is no depth that this man will not sink to.
As bad as his actions are for Americans generally, and gay couples particularly, they are 100 times worse — utter, deadly poison — for children waiting for loving parents and stable homes that they may never have. The children in Gill NEEDED that home. Their degree of deprivation and neglect was horrible.
And why, why would he do such a thing? Is it that he is confused and wrestling with his identity? I don’t think so, no more than any tobacco lobbyist. He was paid (at least) $61,000 for blandly lying in the Gill case.
Comment by Eric — May 5, 2010 @ 12:51 am
He was harming children long before the Florida adoption case. Along with Richard Green he headed up the Feminine Boy Project back in ’72-’86. It was perhaps the classic example of quackery, conversion/reparative therapy as applied to gender variant children, first “prehomosexual” then “pretranssexual” once homosexuality was delisted from the DSM (both are now better understood to be variations in neurological development). They preferred to focus on “young, feminine boys”, going so far as to request therapists’ referrals of the same to them for “treatment”.
(see: http://www.sbpress.com/2010/03/feminine-boy-project/
and for background info on gay conversion therapy, later championed by the Zucker crowd against transgender kids:
http://tierneylab.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/faked-evidence-of-gay-conversion/ )
Dig a little / do some Googling to connect the dots:
George Alan Rekers & Richard Green
Blanchard & Bailey,
Ken Zucker & Paul McHugh & Narth
Paul McHugh and the Vatican
Hints: the nexus was the delisting of homosexuality from the DSM & the founding of the Christian organization, Narth, 35+ years ago. Tie that to what was happening at John Hopkins at the time regarding shielding child molesters from the law & public statements made regarding the same. Fast forward to current involvement with the Christian Right and the Catholic Church’s protection of molesters within the fold.
Each of them is in some way still harming among the most vulnerable children, those born in some way gender variant. Something very, very wrong ties that group together.
Comment by SarasNavel — May 5, 2010 @ 2:38 am
Wouldn’t it be *lovely* to find a straight-line connection to Pope Ratz? Although I’d rather see one to the RC office in charge of picking out seminarians to continue to priesthood.
Comment by swampthing — May 5, 2010 @ 9:19 pm
Thanks for the comments, followups and added information everyone.
Comment by Chris Marshall — May 6, 2010 @ 6:12 pm
To the author,
I am as fervently opposed to this moron’s position of undue credibility as you are but you should know the grammatical errors you continually make detract from the credibility of your own work thus rendering it juvenile instead of poignant. PLEASE have someone proof-read your work before it is posted. You will be taken much more seriously if you can show you understand the difference between ‘to’ and ‘two’. I’m gay and believe if we are to be taken seriously we must show that we are smarter, more logical, and more rational than our opponents. Other than that, great piece!
Comment by My Name — May 8, 2010 @ 3:44 am
“Fair and balanced” foxnews website has ZERO stories on George Rekers. Go to the search option on foxnews.com and type in “George Rekers.” Rush Limbaugh, who was caught with tons of Viagra in the airport going on pre-teen sex tour in Dominican Republic will not talk about George Rekers either. The aforementioned do not want to anger the self-hating closeted gay rightwing Republican. Everyday people simply do not care about gays. They don’t. Only self hating GOP hypocrites care that much about homosexuals and taking away their rights.
Comment by Rush Limbaugh — May 11, 2010 @ 2:03 am
I must disagree, in that the homosexual data George Rekers was working on must necessarily be classified as a science.
How else did he catch the gay? Lab coat, George, a nice formless lab coat (but not one that leaves the rear parts exposed.)
Comment by Gravity Denier — May 11, 2010 @ 12:56 pm
Based on decades of research, clinical practice, and more than 450 authoritative references, homosexuality is not a “lifestyle.” Homosexuality and sexual behavior differences result from sexual center variations in the brain. Homosexuality, excepting adult onsets caused by brain changes due to viruses, tumors, and injuries, are related to hormonal conditioning of the developing brain during fetal development. Homosexuals, when compared to heterosexuals, differ in hormonal differences and responses, uncontrollable reflexes, functional MRI readings, neuroanatomy, etc. Using thousands of subjects, Bell and Weinberg, social psychologists, state “Among both men and women in our study, there is a powerful link between gender nonconformity and the development or homosexuality.” . . . “At the moment, a large body of convincing research appears to suggest a biological foundation for homosexuality.”
Same-sexed partnerships are known to exist in higher mammals and in many intelligent species. Over 250 species show same-sexed attraction and some life long bonding.
Many who are negative to homosexuality are in no manner homophobes. Particularly during adolescence and early adult phases, homophobia presents itself mostly among those who fear their own homosexuality. Research shows many “heterosexuals” vehemently opposed to homosexuality, using scientific measures, respond the same as homosexuals. Physicians and psychologists tend to see these individuals as self-loathing homosexuals. Anti-homosexual religious zealots are either unfamiliar with or deny the voluminous scientific research on sexual orientation.
People who oppose homosexuality are often extremely vocal and few shy away from making homosexuals the target of mean spirited attacks. Christ never mentions homosexuals in the New Testament or the Book of Mormon. Early church scholars with unbridled disdain for homosexuals, Saint John Chrysostom and St. Augustine, who with anguish admits to homosexual practice, discuss I Cor. 6.9-10 and homosexuality is never mentioned. The passage discusses pagan temple practices. In the early Christian church, the punishment for homosexual behavior ranged from penance to excommunication. The word “·ºÄœÅœÉŒµŒ?ŒøŒ?Œø·??œÑŒ±Œ?” which some translate as “homosexual” is best translated, as did Martin Luther, “knabench?§nder” or child molester. Until A.D. 656 Christians debated whether women had souls and the Counci l of Trent “condemned to anathema anyone who said marriage was as virtuous as celibacy.” Marriage is a sacrament of the church not related to the state. It seems the proper religious viewpoint should be only churches can perform “marriages.” The state, not being an arbiter for the church, should issue declarations of domestic partnership regardless of the sex of couples.
A “homosexual agenda” does not exist. Homosexuals are extremely diverse politically and many do not identify with the GLBT (Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgendered) community or consider themselves homosexual. Being part of the GLTB is a social process necessary to help disenfranchised GLTB individuals express their opinions, helping reduce prejudice and discrimination in an anti-GLBT mileu. GLBT emphasize positive image and self-acceptance and are active in numerous charities.
The GLBT tend to rely on scientific studies that show other than sexual orientation, there are few differences between GLBTs and heterosexuals. The GLBT community appears to be advocating for issues like: same-sexed marriage, full citizens’ rights, hate crimes legislation and support for all GLBT persons. The GLBT community supports heterosexuals and appropriate sexual behavior between consenting adults regardless of sexuality.
Heterosexuals dominate as pedophiles, whether the victim is male or female. Groth and Birnbaum , using 275 cases of male child molestation state, “In any case, in over 12 years of clinical experience, we have yet to see any regression from an adult homosexual orientation.” After destruction of the female mating center to reduce a professional man’ interest in male children, his pedophilia became insatiable. Later destruction of his male mating center stopped the unwanted sexual behavior.” Heterosexuals also prey on homosexuals in prison and the military as well as in the community. The macho heterosexual rapes and vilifies his victims and maintains his heterosexuality and status.
While social process is involved in sexual expression, it does not determine sexual orientation. To avoid stigma, some become pseudo-heterosexuals. Religiously motivated conversion therapy has never been scientifically documented to change a persons natural underlying sexual orientation. Pseudo-heterosexuality is the objective of such therapies. Many unable to change are significantly depressed and suicidal. “Two of Exodus International’ founders, Michael Bussee and Garry Cooper, fell in love and left the organization in 1979.”
Sexual orientation should not form the basis for discrimination or inequality. It should remind us of God’ variant creation. Could homosexuality be a means of population control as suggested by Carl Jung? The opposition to GLBT persons is contrary to the compassionate and loving teachings of Jesus Christ (Mt 7.1-5).
Comment by Dr. Norman Murphy — May 27, 2010 @ 12:25 am