FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Wayne Besen, Executive Director
Phone: 917-691-5118
E-mail: wbesen@truthwinsout.org
Sign Petition
Is Right Wing Funded Study Academic Freedom or Fraud, Asks TWO
Burlington, Vt. – Truth Wins Out launched a Change.org petition today calling on University of Texas at Austin to investigate a junk science study by UT professor Mark Regnerus that falsely portrayed gay parents as unfit. The research is clearly a political hit job, and it appears that Regnerus may have manipulated his interpretation of the data to please the virulently anti-gay foundations that funded his pseudo-scientific study. TWO’s petition already has more than 2,670 signatures.
“An investigation is sorely needed to get to the bottom of how an inferior, politically loaded study found its way onto a mainstream campus at the expense of the institution’s academic integrity,” said Truth Wins Out Executive Director Wayne Besen. “What we are looking at with this study is the equivalent of an ugly push poll or a nasty robo call — with footnotes to give it a veneer of academic legitimacy.”
Indeed, the study was funded with a $695,000 grant from the Witherspoon Institute and a $90,000 grant from the archconservative Bradley Foundation. Most ominously, Princeton professor Robert P. George is a key member of Witherspoon. George has been affiliated with the Family Research Council and is a founder of the notoriously anti-gay National Organization for Marriage.
Regnerus wrote in Slate that children of same-sex parents experience greater “household instability” than others, and that it could be too much of a “social gamble” to “support this new (but tiny) family form.” One look at the study, however, reveals his conclusions to be without merit and lacking any basis in sound science.
“Gay parenting is not a gamble, but Regnerus’ study is a scientifically bankrupt house of cards,” said TWO’s Besen. “While Regnerus is trying to bill his work as the ‘gold standard’ of research, upon closer inspection his work looks more like fool’s gold.”
The American Psychological Association (APA) said this week that leading mental health organizations “have concluded that there is no scientific evidence that parenting effectiveness is related to parental sexual orientation.” This is based on “a remarkably consistent body of research on lesbian and gay parents and their children.”
TWO’s petition called for the University of Texas to immediately launch an investigation to determine whether Regnerus’ research was truly independent, or if he worked in concert with anti-gay activists to smear loving gay parents and harm their children. Was the goal to produce legitimate science, or to manufacture a political club for use in an election year with marriage equality on the ballot in four states?
“Creating studies with predetermined results is not academic freedom, but academic fraud,” said TWO’s Besen. “Given the evidence, University of Texas should find out if the results of this study were cooked.”
Truth Wins Out is a nonprofit organization that fights anti-LGBT extremism. TWO specializes in turning information into action by organizing, advocating and fighting for LGBT equality.
Another self hating gay man ready too unleash his hateful venom…
I believe what we have here is the old maxim of lies, damned lies, and statistics. I wonder how many people are going to have to suffer before we get a retraction, such as Dr Robert Spitzer gave us last month? http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/19/health/dr-robert-l-spitzer-noted-psychiatrist-apologizes-for-study-on-gay-cure.html?_r=2
I think this is the wrong approach. Science does not work by popular vote, and the academic freedom trumps pretty much everything.
A much healthier way to continue is to request the raw data, and reanalyze the data using proper methods, preferably by someone who is independent and has a solid reputation. That is how science is done, and that is how you can neutralize the article the best.
I agree with you, Kim. I am sorry but this petition comes across as a personal vendetta, an act of harassment, more than anything else.
If you think we are having an academic debate over science you are delusional. Wake up and look at the facts. This was a political hit job. That some people can’t recognize the obvious is why liberals often lose. They get whacked over the head with a political study and they want to talk about data sets. How many times can some people get rolled before they catch on?
Only to you, Jeremiah. Only to you.
Kim, science also doesn’t work when claims are made from research that doesn’t support those claims. You obviously didn’t read any of the postings about this study or the study itself–yet you still make claims. You’re the reason that we need to be vigilant in pointing out bad “science”. Shame on you.
There’s no hop for Jeremiah.
No hop and no “hope” for Jeremiah.
Mark Regnerus will end up like the guy who claimed vaccines caused autism.
[...] do antigay Witherspoon Institute e $90.000 da Bradley Foundation. A organização Truth Wins lançou uma campanha pedindo a Universidade para investigar o [...]
[...] Besen of Truth Wins Out has started a petition, asking UTA President William Powers, Jr. to investigate [...]
“Academic Freedom” does not involve fabricating data, eschewing relevant data, manipulating data, nor finding data which fits a preconceived notion and then ignoring everything else, nor in comparing two things which have nothing to do with each other. Just as plagiarism is not “Academic Freedom,” neither is just lies and bull. The man has forfeited his right to “Academic” anything. Many a scientific fraud has been drummed out of the academy for just such nonsense.
On the other hand, it has nothing to do with “conservative” or “liberal” — for years Liberals pushed the junk science of Global Warming as a political tool — and now it’s been mostly debunked. (Oh, I’m sure I’ll get hit over the head with the political mush in 3, 2, 1…)
Junk is junk, from any quarter, and deserves scorn and it’s pushers removal from the academy.