Exclusive Truth Wins Out interview with Thomas Maier
For decades, anti-gay organizations have gleefully pointed to Masters & Johnson’s 1979 book, “Homosexuality in Perspective”, that claimed to cure homosexuality. Indeed, Dr. William H. Masters and Virgina E. Johnson, the husband and wife sex research team, went on Meet the Press on Sunday, April 22, 1979, to discuss their finding that homosexuals could be converted into heterosexuals. The book has since been used by the so-called “ex-gay” industry to “prove” gays could go straight, if they just tried hard enough.
In his groundbreaking new book, “Masters of Sex”, author Thomas Maier discovered through investigative reporting that the results of Masters & Johnson’s study were entirely fabricated. Virginia Johnson acknowledged that the results were fake. She had actually argued in 1978 that book should never have seen the light of day – but it was already to late in the publishing process to undo the damage.
One can not overstate the importance of Maier’s findings. They undo the very underpinnings of the so-called “ex-gay” therapy movement, further showing that there is no scientific evidence or data to support the outdated idea that gay people can become heterosexual through therapy. Indeed, many people who have undergone such “treatment” claim the experience was harmful and that they were psychologically damaged. The American Psychiatric Association says that attempts to change sexual orientation can lead to “anxiety, depression and self-destructive behavior.”
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The only example of being ex-gay that I can imagine is my particular experience.
I fell in love with a guy and was in a relationship with him as a teenager and at that age because I was in a same sex relationship, I came out as ‘gay’ not knowing about bisexuality, I was 13 and he is bisexual as well and did the same too at the time. We both always talked about hot girls and flirted and checked them out but since we were into each other, we called ourselves gay. We were both popular and desired too and when we went back to being best friends, the girls we dated after that year of fun, went around the school thinking they were hot stuff and both bragged about ‘turning us straight’. It is funny to think about but most of the time, it is vice versa, where gay people when they are confused come out as bisexual.
But that is the only ex-gay example I can imagine. I guess the delusional born agains will have to get in touch with the times, I mean if my lesbian Catholic mother can go back to church and people, Catholics even, don’t even mention it, when 16 years ago she was told not to go to church anymore when she first came out (a true godsend at 12 years of age and hating church)…
These wingnuts need to find another money scam and stop preying on vulnerable oppressed human beings.
Comment by Matt — June 3, 2009 @ 10:33 pm
Yes, it is a shame that these folks must resort to fake studies and outright misinformation to win converts. If they were honest, they would not have too many followers.
Comment by Wayne Besen — June 4, 2009 @ 3:08 pm
Believing in ex-gay “therapy” is, in my opinion, magical thinking. Magical thinking is a sign of mental illness. It really makes one wonder who should be treating whom.
Comment by Scott — June 4, 2009 @ 5:55 pm
the only way to be healed by sexual brokenness that is associated with homosexuality is jesus christ. simply “trying hard” to become heterosexual will obviously not work, as this article states. there is hope found in christ and he is healing me and has already healed a lot of brokenness brought on by homosexuality. though unpopular and usually unacknowledged by the scientific community, god does heal people struggling with homosexuality. we can do nothing by ourselves.
Comment by henry — June 5, 2009 @ 12:52 am
Yes, Henry, I believe that God does heal people. He doesn’t heal people of homosexuality, however, any more than he heals people of heterosexuality.
Comment by William — June 5, 2009 @ 3:28 am
Henry, I am SO glad God is healing you of your homosexuality! You are after all, naturally heterosexual and homosexuality is unnatural for you so I’m glad God is helping you!
Just like, I prayed to God for many years trying to become heterosexual and none of it worked. The only thing that made me happy was to accept myself as a gay person. God showed me that being homosexual was who I was and he eventually helped me accept that!
Isn’t it wonderful how God works???
Comment by James — June 5, 2009 @ 7:28 am
Yes, James, you’re so right: it is indeed wonderful how God works. My experience is very similar to yours. I prayed to God repeatedly during my teenage years to “heal” my homosexuality and to make me heterosexual (like my dad, my brothers and my mates). As I’d always been taught, however, God doesn’t always answer our prayers in the way that we expect. What he did for me was gradually to heal me of the delusion that I needed to be heterosexual, and for that I’ll always be grateful to him.
Comment by William — June 5, 2009 @ 8:45 am
The fallacy in your statement that science rarely acknowledges God is outstanding. A short list, we will do 5… Issac Newton, Albert Einstein, Galileo Galilei, Alexander Flemming, Carl Linnaeus… all devout, all made huge contributions to science.
BTW tell many of my gay friends and they will give you the same story about how they prayed year after year, and begged and wished, and denied their homosexuality… and it came close to destroying them all, once they came to terms they became healthier happier people.
Gay Pride.
Comment by Bjorn — June 21, 2009 @ 11:39 pm
Actually, Bjorn, I think it’s true to say that science as such doesn’t acknowledge, or at least take account of, God. It can’t be otherwise because belief in God isn’t, strictly speaking, scientific – which is NOT to say that it’s therefore invalid. But I fully agree with you that science and belief in God are in no way incompatible. You’ve given an excellent short list of eminent scientists of past centuries who believed in God. Here are five of my favourites from more recent times: Sir Oliver Lodge (physicist), Sir William Barrett (physicist), Camille Flammarion (astronomer), Sir Alistair Hardy (biologist) and John Polkinghorne (physicist). Flammarion, I think, would have described himself as a deist, although he was brought up as a Christian and at one time trained for the Catholic priesthood; all the others were or are Christians.
What I DON’T think is logically compatible with science is fundamentalism.
Comment by William — June 22, 2009 @ 2:50 pm
That’s right William. Religion is not incompatible with science, but fundamentalism is.
We had a discussion last semester in my Sociology class of whether or not religious people can also believe in science.
Yes they can. But only if the religion is not close-minded (i.e. fundamentalism). Many devout Christians consider themselves “a believer of science” but when you present to them, all the overwhelming evidence that homosexuality is not a mental illness, is not a choice, and that sexuality is an innate part of who someone is, be it homosexual OR heterosexual, then that’s when they pull the bible card and say that it’s wrong.
Fundamentalist Christians ONLY support science when it coincides with their beliefs. If it goes against their beliefs, then they say it’s wrong. When in science, you must believe evidence. Even if you do not agree with the evidence, then you cannot turn away and call it “wrong” simply because you do not want to. Open-mindedness is necessary.
Comment by James — June 22, 2009 @ 5:24 pm
[...] the use of the Masters and Johnson study is truly flabbergasting. Truth Wins Out reported on the refutation of the Masters and Johnson study quite a while ago [...]
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[...] book (not an article) he quotes was disavowed last year by Virginia Johnson in Thomas Maier’s groundbreaking book Masters of Sex. Indeed, the results were said to have been entirely fabricated. Virginia Johnson [...]
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