The cynically named “Day of Truth,” organized by the antigay Alliance Defense Fund and planned for April 28, is little more than an excuse to inject “ex-gay” propaganda and a disruptive dose of antigay prejudice in public schools.

Ex-gay survivor Daniel Gonzales, who was inappropriately treated by famed reparative therapist Joseph Nicolosi, has released a new video that itemizes the untruths and prejudices that are promoted by the DOT. Check it out:

Jonathan Rowe of Positive Liberty and Ed Brayton of Dispatches from the Culture Wars catch Concerned Women for America’s Matt Barber issuing lies about ex-gay fugitive Lisa Miller, gay persons’ lifespans, and researchers’ concerns over religious-right disinformation about life-expectancy data.

Police continue to investigate multiple death threats against Montgomery County, Maryland, council member Duchy Trachtenberg.

Trachtenberg has been threatened because of her support of a bill opposing discrimination against transgender county residents. Letters to her have allegedly varied in tone, from outright threats to profane language to haughty messages parroting ex-gay and antigay memes unrelated to transgender issues.

One of those letter-writers is Sharon Kass of Silver Spring, Md., an increasingly prolific enemy of civility in public discourse about gay and transgender equality. (Read More)

Focus science coverup: While acknowledging his role in cultural warfare, Glenn Stanton of Focus on the Family declines to acknowledge that his employer covered up numerous false claims in a widely distributed and uncorrected press release about the alleged anthropology of marriage. Instead, he admits that publication of the release was premature, but he offers no retraction. Stanton has agreed to dialogue with an anthropologist on a watchdog blog, safely out of view of Focus’ subscribers and media contacts.

Investor activism: With the help of other religious conservatives, Exodus conference speaker Ken Hutcherson has launched a religious-right investor activist group to steer companies toward policies that discriminate against their workers who happen to be same-sex-attracted, according to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

“Gender identity is very important to God,” according to Exodus executive vice president Randy Thomas.

But what verses of the Bible or any other authoritative religious document refer to “gender identity”? In an interview published today by Focus on the Family, Thomas does not say.

Sidestepping specifics about the Bible, Thomas ignores a growing Christian debate about gender-variant Biblical role models and eunuchs, broadly labels gender-variant individuals as “confused,” and offers a bold generalization: that the courage to express one’s individuality is the fault of unidentified “activists.” (Read More)

In a March 2008 article for Focus on the Family’s male youth magazine Breakaway, Focus operative and Exodus former chairman Mike Haley invents three myths, attributes them to “homosexual activists” in order to alarm the readership, and then proceeds to refute his own myths. Haley confuses his audience by claiming that he is “clearing up the confusion” about sexual orientation and then offering falsehoods instead. Here are Haley’s myths, followed by the facts he chose to withhold:

(Read More)

Glenn Stanton of Focus on the Family declared March 3 that there is a “clear consensus” among anthropologists that “a family is a unit that draws from the two types of humanity, male and female.” Focus suggested that anthropologists are opposed to gay marriage, falsely stated that anthropologists agree that “traditional” marriage is best, and claimed that gay people are trying to change the definition of marriage “because they say the traditional definition is irrational and bigoted.”

After Box Turtle Bulletin contacted several anthropologists, the American Anthropological Association wrote directly to Focus to correct Focus’ false statements:

(Read More)

Journey Into Manhood is a $650-per-person, ex-gay weekend boot camp for men who mistakenly believe that homosexuality is caused by inadequate masculinity. The retreat is operated by an ex-gay advocacy group called People Can Change.

In response to criticism by a pro-exgay pundit of the retreat’s controversial pro-gay origins and secret practices, PCC recently released a rigged customer-satisfaction survey which claimed overwhelming success — by excluding most of the retreat’s dissatisfied participants from the survey.

According to The Washington Blade, Doug Haldeman — a gay psychologist based in Seattle and a board member of the American Psychological Association — has joined public criticism of the survey. Haldeman said the name of the retreat, “Journey Into Manhood,” has an inherent bias presupposing that “anyone who is struggling with feelings of same-sex attraction is not a man.” Haldeman also criticized the survey for failing to identify why participants wanted to change their sexual orientation.

“Most of those groups use convenient sample surveys like that and try and call it research,” he said. “What they really are … just amounts to testimonials of people that I believe are pressured, either externally and internally, into something as difficult as trying to change your sexual orientation.”

(Read More)

Focus on the Family denies the existence of former ex-gays — a growing movement of hundreds of people who have discovered through personal experience that ex-gay activists’ claims are not only false, but toxic to families and communities.

Former ex-gays gathered this weekend in Memphis, Tenn., at the same time as Focus’ ex-gay roadshow, Love Won Out, which appeals to antigay pastors and parents of gay persons with sales pitches for ex-gay propaganda and political appeals to deny equality to gay couples.

According to Peterson Toscano, a survivor of Exodus International’s flagship live-in program Love In Action: “They [Focus on the Family] basically tell parents of lesbian and gay kids that it’s bad to be gay, and they give testimonies about how awful people’s lives were while they were gay. They say they can change and save you.”

In promoting its roadshow, Focus on the Family on Feb. 20 described former ex-gays (who were to come from as far away as California and Connecticut) as “local activists” who advocate “a revisionist view of the Bible.” Focus concealed the central fact that the “activists” included former ex-gays.

Love In Action has similarly shielded its participants from survivors and allies who have held vigils nearby. Jacob Wilson, now 22, was an ex-gay participant in LIA in 2005. According to the Memphis Commercial-Appeal:

After Wilson left LIA, he found out what the protesters had wanted him to know.

“These people weren’t doing it to be activists, they were doing it to show that we weren’t alone, that we were loved … It crushes me that that message was cut from us.”

(Read More)

TruthWinsOut.org expressed concern today over a Reuters news story about a drug-resistant strain of MRSA bacteria that is more prevalent among gay men in urban centers, such as Boston and San Francisco. The organization also slammed extremist groups for exploiting the news in order to smear the GLBT community and advance an agenda of pure prejudice and discrimination.

“The comments by Concerned Women for America is hatred in its rawest and ugliest form,” said Wayne Besen, Executive Director of TruthWinsOut.org. “These wing nuts wasted no time seeking the spotlight and creating a climate of panic and fear. They are factually wrong, morally wrong-headed and tragically addicted to bigotry.”

Matt Barber, policy director for cultural issues with Concerned Women for America, used the news to viciously attack gay people. “Citizens, especially parents, need to stand up and say, ‘No More! We will no longer sit idly by while politically correct cultural elites endanger our children and larger communities through propagandist promotion of this demonstrably deadly lifestyle,’” Barber said.
(Read More)