Contact: Wayne Besen, Executive Director
Phone: 917-691-5118
E-Mail: wbesen@truthwinsout.org
TWO Demands ‘Ex-Gay’ Group Apologize For Defamatory Remarks Within Five Days Or Face Legal Action
PFOX President Greg Quinlan’s Fabricated Tale Claiming TWO Tried to Have Him Murdered is Unconscionable and Unacceptable, Says TWO
Burlington, Vt. – Truth Wins Out sent a letter to Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays today sternly warning PFOX that it would face legal consequences if it did not publicly apologize within five days for defaming TWO Executive Director Wayne Besen. The letter from Virginia attorney Michael Hamar outlined four concrete demands that PFOX would have to satisfy to avoid having the matter settled in a court of law.
On October 7, 2011 Quinlan was interviewed on News-Plus with Mark Segraves (WDCW-TV). At the 10:38 mark of the show, Quinlan (pictured) fabricates an alleged hit on his life. According to Quinlan:
“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.”
“Greg Quinlan deliberately and maliciously fabricated a story with the sole purpose of smearing Truth Wins Out and damaging my reputation,” said Truth Wins Out Executive Director Wayne Besen. “These defamatory actions are unconscionable, unacceptable, and I refuse to let these vicious lies go unanswered.”
Hamar sent his letter to PFOX outlining the necessary steps to ameliorate the situation:
1. A written retraction be issued by Gregory Quinlan on PFOX letterhead admitting he fabricated the incident(s) and made untrue statements during the television interview. The retraction must be signed by PFOX’s Executive Director Regina Griggs and Mr. Quinlan.
2. A YouTube video of Mr. Quinlan apologizing for the false and defamatory statements.
3. Mr. Quinlan will offer to immediately make an apology on the very television show in which the defamatory statements about Mr. Besen were made.
4. PFOX will send out a press release, first approved by Mr. Besen, announcing the apology.
“These terms must be accepted within five business days of receipt of this letter,” wrote TWO attorney Michael Hamar. “Should Mr. Quinlan and PFOX refuse to accept these terms, Mr. Besen will have no alternative other than to seek relief in court and in the process of the litigation subject Mr. Quinlan and/or PFOX to depositions, interrogatories and other discovery processes.”
The veracity of PFOX has long been questioned. Its former president, Richard Cohen, was expelled for life from the American Counseling Association for multiple ethics violations. A key member of the organization’s Speaker’s Bureau, Arthur Abba Goldberg, is a convicted felon sent to prison for financial fraud. In 2010, Quinlan attended a conference organized by Americans for Truth About Homosexuality, a group that is listed as a certified Southern Poverty Law Center hate group. During his speech at the meeting, Quinlan disparaged LGBT people and said that when he used to live as an openly gay man he wasn’t a “flaming faggot.”
“I wasn’t your flaming faggot, you know,” Quinlan told the chuckling crowd. “I can say that because I’ve been there and done that. You know, the one’s whose wrists are so limp that when the wind blows they slap themselves in the face. I wasn’t one of them.”
Please consider a tax-deductible contribution to Truth Wins Out today to help us fight this critical legal battle with PFOX. If we don’t stand up to such blatant lies, we are giving our opponents a green light to smear the entire LGBT community.
It is critical that we finally push back and say “ENOUGH IS ENOUGH!” If we won’t fight back when they accuse us of attempted murder — when will we? The time to take a stand against these dishonest bullies is NOW!
On October 7, 2011 Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays (PFOX) President Greg Quinlan was interviewed on News-Plus with Mark Segraves (WDCW-TV). Throughout the show, Quinlan distorts reality and flat out lies on many subjects. However, at the 10:38 mark he commits slander. According to Quinlan:
“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.”
Unfortunately for Quinlan nothing he said about me or Truth Wins Out is true or accurate. What he said was outright libel and a complete fabrication that he invented out of thin air. It speaks to Quinlan’s character that he lies so easily and simply makes things up. As for me, I’d be more than happy to take a lie detector test or a NoLie MRI to prove that I’ve never said such vile words. Will Quinlan also take these tests to prove the “veracity” of his calumny?
Truth Wins Out is exploring its legal options. Do our readers think that we should sue PFOX and Quinlan for libel and defamation?
As you all know, Apple pulled the bigoted Exodus iPhone app after our petition drew over 150,000 signatures from customers demanding that the company treat anti-gay apps the same way they would racist or anti-Semitic apps. In reality, it never should have been approved in the first place, but mistakes are made sometimes, and Apple has corrected it. Unfortunately, a writer at another gay blog seems to have a problem with that, so I’d like to take a few minutes to set the record straight by responding to any misunderstandings they may have about what this was and was not about, starting with our old, original logo, with its completely wrongheaded accompanying caption:
Here is the oh-so-cute caption they placed beneath that graphic: “…But only if opposing viewpoints are effectively silenced?”
Um, no. The entire Religious Right has a louder voice in this country than their numbers would suggest, and no one is taking anything from them that falls under the category of “freedom of speech.” But more on that later. Let’s have a look-see at the article:
So why are we not exactly celebrating here at AfterElton? First, we’re bracing for the inevitable: complaints from groups like Exodus, AFA and NOM that this is yet another example of “gay activists” bullying and trying to silence Christians.
Yes, that’s what they say every single time their fee fees get hurt, on every loud speaker they can find. Their views, somehow, are never silenced, especially by Truth Wins Out and the other gay news sources which actually are experts on the Religious Right, who make a daily practice of quoting these people’s words verbatim. If we were trying to “silence” their voices, we’d hide under a rock and hope that makes them go away. Moving on:
Second, and more importantly, as vehemently as we might disagree with Exodus International’s mission and beliefs, we think they should be allowed to express them.
And they do. Moving on:
Exodus International’s smartphone app was basically a platform for their blogs, podcasts, latest news and FAQs – essentially the same material you could find if you went to their website. It’s not as if the thing was marketed as some sort of magical/religious gay cure in and of itself.
AND what does Exodus International do for a living?! They market “freedom from the homosexual lifestyle!” If one spent any time with the app itself, one would have found that the app opened up a world of false information and defamation of LGBT people. Indeed, Dr. Gary Remafedi specifically wrote a letter to Apple, stating that the Exodus app featured misrepresentations of his own scientific research, and that therefore they should remove the app.
And even if it was, anybody offended and yes, disgusted even, by the Exodus International app could of course choose not to download and install it.
Ah, yes. Freedom of choice. Just like you can choose not to go to a website you don’t like/are disgusted by. We’re winding up to the smackdown here, folks, give me two more paragraphs.
But honestly, how many people were offended by the application itself? How many people even saw the thing? Certainly not 150,000. It’s more likely that most of the people signing that Change.org petition simply didn’t like Exodus International and all that they stand for.
Would 150,000 people signing a petition against a KKK app need to actually see/download it to express their outrage?
Apple says the app was removed because it was “offensive to large groups of people.” But lots of things are offensive to large groups of people. Does the GLBT community really want that to be the standard for what is allowed on Apple’s increasingly pivotal app store? How soon until Apple gets a petition to remove Grindr? What if The Trevor Project tried to release an app to assist gay teens?
Indeed, and I wish Apple had worded that better, but the reason we petitioned for its removal is because it went against Apple’s own corporate policies in that it was defamatory against an entire minority group, and moreover, it spread false information about that group. So, if a bunch of wingnuts whine and start a petition against Grindr, they’re going to have to prove that Grindr defames them in some way, and it doesn’t. There are thousands of Christian apps available, and it’s important to note why we petitioned against this app. It has nothing to do with “opposing viewpoints,” and it certainly doesn’t have a damn thing to do with the First freaking Amendment.
Speaking of gay teens, Truth Wins Out claimed that a key rationale for the petition was “stopping a virulently anti-gay organization from peddling false speech at the expense of vulnerable LGBT youth.” This has an ironically familiar ring to it. The right is forever saying it is teens and children who should be protected from gay content. With this precedent established those Christian activists can now make the exact same case in opposing any gay apps they don’t like.
Oh, well, I don’t know how much time you spend covering things like gay teen suicide and the damage religious extremists do to gay teens and young adults, because I don’t read your blog, but we’re sort of the experts on that, seeing as it’s in our Mission Statement. So you might think it sounds “ironically familiar,” but whereas the Right doesn’t have the moral authority or the concrete evidence to show that they have a good reason to protect youth from gay people, we have both the moral authority and the concrete evidence, and the statistics on bullying and suicide, and a treasure trove of testimony and reporting on the effects of so-called “reparative therapy,” and unlike the Religious Right, we can back up our assertions with the findings of every single major medical and mental health organization in the United States.
Earlier this month the Supreme Court in an 8-1 decision ruled that the Westboro Baptist Church had a First Amendment Right to wave their vile “God Hates Fags” signs outside of military funerals.
And the court got it exactly right.
Of course, you can distinguish the Westboro decision from the facts here in that Westboro was spewing their hateful message in a public space. Apple’s online app store is a private space, and thus they have the right to include/exclude whatever organizations and applications they want.
Well, if I had known you were going to win my side of the argument for me, I wouldn’t have wasted all this time.
But it seems clear that Apple’s dominance in the smartphone and tablet markets means that their App store has become a substantial channel for communication. How confident are you that the next public outcry and petition that Apple responds to won’t be to kick off a pro-Gay app?
We’re not very confident at all.
Are you scared? I mean, we’ll be there to fight it if that happens, but I’m a bit stunned that a blog purporting to represent the interests of the LGBT community is so willing to defend an organization with a proven track record of hurting gay people and their families. Yes, the App store is a “substantial channel for communication.” It’s also a private corporation, and as long as their policies are what they are, we will fight for people to recognize that true defamation against LGBT people has no place where racism, anti-semitism and other forms of bigotry would otherwise not be tolerated.
It is really that simple. I will allow that Apple often applies its policies inconsistently, and that this is a situation that will probably be revisited at some point in the future, for some reason, but that is not an excuse to tuck tail and run when something as egregious as this slips by their filters. Obviously over 150,000 petition signers agree.
UPDATE: If anyone is not quite clear on who the victims of reparative therapy are, what it does to them, and why Exodus’s “ministry” is really just a front for a hate organization against the LGBT community, please read this in its entirety. An excerpt:
Being an ex-gay survivor myself and personally speaking with over 1,500 fellow survivors, I can say that [Exodus's Jeff] Buchanan is correct on one point—Exodus has no cure to offer. Instead they issue a curse for those who submit or are forced to submit to their teachings. They offer harm—psychological, emotional, and spiritual damage. They tamper with their clients’ relationships, careers, personal development, and finances. They make a mess of our lives in Jesus’ name.
So what exactly does Exodus do? They now publicly admit that no one changes from gay to straight. They claim they don’t offer a cure. They say they don’t therapize. What services do they provide? Basically they will undermine your sense of self as they reinforce the notion that you are not good enough as a lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer person. They will demonize your desires, and will not even be satisfied if you choose to be celibate yet insist on honestly calling yourself lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or queer. To add insult to injury they have fought to deny happy homosexuals and transgender people legal rights and protections. They malign LGBTQ people, our relationships, our desires, our dreams, and then they export this message to Uganda, South Africa, Croatia, Singapore, Costa Rica and beyond.
As I said, read it all.
UPDATE DEUX: I just took a gander at AfterElton’s homepage, seeing as, as I said before, it’s never a blog that’s seemed remotely useful to me in any way. As I expected, their piece on this was the only one which even approached an attempt to speak about something of actual import to the LGBT community outside of pop culture or Lady GaGa or Glee or whatever the hell else. Ya know, there are some who can do both. Joe does. Andy does. But then there are some who can’t and shouldn’t try, those who should leave it to the grown-ups.
The Christian Right’s year-old “Manhattan Declaration” — a manifesto to destroy true marriage and religious liberty, replacing both with Stepford marriages and Christianist theocracy — is circulating within the conservative echo chamber again.
Fueled by a manufactured controversy in which Apple Inc. removed the broadly defamatory Declaration from its App Store, a new round of naïve or disingenuous Christian bloggers call the declaration “civil,” “graceful” and other absurdities that should be apparent to rational people who respect individual freedom, reject piety, and know the history of the declaration’s sponsors.
A study appearing in the September issue of the Journal of Homosexuality suggests that negative ex-gay and antigay attitudes — not homosexual behavior or same-sex orientation — worsen mental health and sexual health.
Researchers at the University of Minnesota have published a study showing that the degree of internalized homonegativity (negative attitude towards homosexuality) among homosexual men is what predicts poor mental and sexual health — not the act of being homosexual.
Simon Rosser, Ph.D, is the study’s principal investigator and a researcher of the university’s School of Public Health.
“Given the debates in many religious denominations about homosexuality, and in society about homosexuals and civil rights, it’s also timely,” Rosser said. “In particular, the old advice to gay men to fight, deny, or minimize their homosexuality likely only increases depression, greater isolation, and poorer sexual health. In short, viewing homosexuality as a disorder is not only inaccurate, it may be harmful as well.”
This research, which is part of the HIV prevention program — funded by the Minnesota Department of Health — has also been shown to be effective in reducing unsafe sex.
The anti-life, religious-rightist LifeSiteNews last week distorted the results of a British study that came to the same conclusion. LSN falsely associated depression and self-destructive behavior with “a homosexual lifestyle” despite findings to the contrary, and cited the discredited work of antigay activists Paul and Kirk Cameron for additional support.
Meanwhile, a new paper in Science, Political Attitudes Vary with Physiological Traits, finds that social conservatives may be more biologically predisposed to respond to fear and threats than the general population. Might these conservatives then assume, wrongly, that everyone else will (or should) react to fear and threats in a manner consistent with their own reaction?
ScienceBlogs provides detailed analysis of the paper. One take-home point:
For example, consider if the “conservative” psychology is typified by a heuristic & bias which orients toward conformity to current norms. In contrast, the “liberal” psychology has a more relaxed heuristic and is less biased toward current norms. That means naturally that liberal personality types would “random walk” out of the the central tendency of the population more often, so that you would see average differences between the two groups. But, that doesn’t define the distribution itself. What is conservative in 2008 might very well be rather liberal in 1950. For example, arguing against gay marriage but accepting the possibility of civil unions.
Visit Skipping to the Piccolo for pro-tolerant religious reaction to the Journal of Homosexuality study.
On March 1, 2008, 35 Australian Christian ministers apologized for years of antigay defamation and discrimination, which they called “un-Christian.” More ministers would have apologized, but several ministers were threatened into silence by antigay superiors.
Anthony Venn-Brown of Freedom 2 b[e] has just released video of these apologies to gay and gender-variant persons.
Addendum, April 13: Venn-Brown announced via e-mail this evening that the “100 Revs” apology has won an award for Most Outstanding Political Comment from the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras.
Focus on the Family admitted today that Canadian Bill C-250 has caused it to alter its Canadian antigay propaganda.
Bill C-250 added penalties to the Criminal Code of Canada for inciting hatred or encouraging genocide of people on the basis of sexual orientation, in addition to race, religion, ethnic origin, gender, color, and disability.
The law states that no one may be convicted if:
(a) if he establishes that the statements communicated were true;
(b) if, in good faith, the person expressed or attempted to establish by an argument an opinion on a religious subject or an opinion based on a belief in a religious text;
(c) if the statements were relevant to any subject of public interest, the discussion of which was for the public benefit, and if on reasonable grounds he believed them to be true; or
(d) if, in good faith, he intended to point out, for the purpose of removal, matters producing or tending to produce feelings of hatred toward an identifiable group in Canada.
The key defense is (a): Speech may not be punished if it’s true.
And that has been a problem for Focus on the Family, which — its critics allege — has persistently relied in the United States upon sweeping, unfounded, and malicious falsehoods about the behavior and values of same-sex-attracted persons as a class.
Today, Focus communications operative Gary Booker told WorldNetDaily:
“In particular, our content producers are careful not to make generalized statements nor comments that may be perceived as ascribing malicious intent to a ‘group’ of people and are always careful to treat even those who might disagree with us with respect,” Gary Booker, director of global content creation for Focus, told WorldNetDaily.com.
“Occasionally, albeit very rarely, some content is identified that, while acceptable for airing in the U.S. would not be acceptable under Canadian law and is therefore edited or omitted in Canada.”
In the United States, the First Amendment to the Constitution has acted as a bar against similar legislation.
Humbled Infidel has the complete speech by ex-gay activist Stephen Black at a pro-bigotry rally held April 2 on behalf of Oklahoma state Rep. Sally Kern.
Black is the executive director of First Stone Ministries, an Oklahoma-based Exodus member “ministry.”
A point-by-point analysis of Black’s speech finds appeals to conformity, false and unsourced statistics, and sweeping dehumanization of sexual strugglers. Instead of healing strugglers and reuniting families, Black’s rhetoric divides families and alienates Americans whom he has falsely maligned.
Oklahoma state legislator Sally Kern claims that the Oklahoma City chapter of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) misquoted her positions on discrimination, sin, and civility after a meeting between her and PFLAG representatives.
But PFLAG’s fact-checking reveals that it is Kern who has misrepresented PFLAG’s carefully worded account of their meeting. Kern’s latest volley of strawman arguments and uncivil vitriol against the families of gay people suggests, at the very least, that she has ensnarled herself in her own tangled web of hate speech against parents and Christian clergy.
After all, why should Kern bother to calmly discuss what she or PFLAG actually said, when it’s so much easier to rant breathlessly about what Kern imagines herself, others — or God — to be saying?
Against freedom: An antigay Catholic group is upset that many Catholic universities permit freedom of speech and freedom of association among their gay-tolerant students and faculty. Styling itself as “The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property,” the group claims that, out of 211 U.S. Catholic universities and colleges, at least 96 have pro-tolerance clubs on campus. Patrick Reilly of the Cardinal Newman Society equates tolerance of homosexual persons and their constitutional rights with promotion of homosexual activity, and he insinuates that sexual honesty is incompatible with “students’ moral formation.” Focus on the Family appears sympathetic to both Catholic antigay groups. (Focus)
Freedom from crime a “special right”: In its ongoing war against young victims of violence, the antigay American Family Association of Michigan has targeted state Sen. Valde Garcia, a Republican, for his support of legislation to protect students from bullying. Gary Glenn of AFA/M asserts that protection from bullying amounts to “special rights” if youths’ specific at-risk demographics are acknowledged. But Garcia says he had already threatened to withdraw his sponsorship of the legislation unless a list of protected demographics was removed. However, Garcia then contradicted himself — admitting he would hypothetically support legislation granting explicit anti-crime protections if they were limited to seniors, children and police. According to Sean Kosofsky of The Triangle Foundation, “If it’s not specific, it [anti-bullying legislation] will end up having little impact.” Kosofsky added, “There’s nothing gay about this bill whatsoever. It protects all students.” (Daily Press & Argus)
Gay genetics study: ABC News oversimplifies research into ties between genetics and homosexuality by falsely suggesting up-front that researchers seek a single gene that might explain sexual orientation. That’s not the case. According to the fine print in ABC’s own news story, the hypothesis is more complex:
Dr. Alan Sanders, a psychiatric geneticist at Northwestern Healthcare Research Institute, is currently heading the biggest study ever undertaken on sexual orientation. He’s looking at the genetic makeup of more than 700 sets of gay brothers.
“I think the evidence is pretty convincing already that a substantial contribution to sexual orientation comes from genetics,” he said. “It’s probably the single biggest factor that we know about.”
FRC apologizes: Peter Sprigg of the Family Research Council apologizes for suggesting that America export its gay citizens in lieu of granting legal immigration to their foreign partners. (FRC Blog)
Kern meets with PFLAG: Oklahoma state Rep. Sally Kern still says equality for gay people is a bigger threat to America than terrorists — and further calls her opinion “Biblical.” But she has also met with members of the Oklahoma City chapter of Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays, and stated that she opposes discrimination against gays in the workplace. That should infuriate Concerned Women for America, which defended Kern’s terror talk as something that “reasonable people can debate.” Earlier, Kern debated a gay Christian pastor on KFOR-TV. (Queerty, PageOneQ, Good As You)
Burlington, Vt. – Truth Wins Out sent a letter to Parents and Friends of Ex-Gays today sternly warning PFOX that it would face legal consequences if it did not publicly apologize within five days for defaming TWO Executive Director Wayne Besen. The letter from Virginia attorney Michael Hamar outlined four concrete demands that PFOX would have to satisfy to avoid having the matter settled in a court of law.
The veracity of PFOX has long been questioned. Its former president, Richard Cohen, was expelled for life from the American Counseling Association for multiple ethics violations. A key member of the organization’s Speaker’s Bureau, Arthur Abba Goldberg, is a convicted felon sent to prison for financial fraud. In 2010, Quinlan attended a conference organized by Americans for Truth About Homosexuality, a group that is listed as a certified Southern Poverty Law Center hate group. During his speech at the meeting, Quinlan disparaged LGBT people and said that when he used to live as an openly gay man he wasn’t a “flaming faggot.”
