Dr. Gary Remafedi Says Conservative Group Guilty of “Gross Misrepresentation” And Questions If Focus Actually Read His Article Before Misquoting It

NEW YORK — TruthWinsOut.org published a letter today from a researcher who claims Focus on the Family twisted his work. In the letter, Gary Remafedi, M.D., M.P.H., a professor of pediatrics at the University of Minnesota, asked Focus on the Family’ leader James Dobson to stop misrepresenting his findings from a key 1992 study.

“I want to draw your attention to a gross misrepresentation of our research at the website of Focus on the Family,” Remafedi wrote in his letter to Dobson. “More important, had the authors of “Myths and Facts” actually read the article, they would have found no support for their contention that “many children experience a period of sexual-identity confusion when they can be influenced in either direction.’”

(Full Text of Letter Below)

Remafedi’ report was published in Pediatrics in 1992. The study explored patterns of sexual orientation in a representative sample of more than 34,000 Minnesota students in grades 7 to 12. Focus on the Family distorted his findings to make the case that young people should not learn about homosexuality because they were sexually confused, and could thus be influenced by educational material.

“Focus on the Family has engaged in a disturbing pattern of misrepresenting the work of legitimate researchers to further their anti-gay agenda,” said Wayne Besen, Executive Director of TruthWinsOut.org. “We call on Focus on the Family to immediately expunge all falsehoods and fallacies presented as”facts’ from their past and present literature.” (Read More)

– The symposium will be at 2:00 p.m. on Monday afternoon (5/5/08) in lecture halls 159 A & B in the Washington, D.C., Convention Center –

Since 1973, the once dreaded American Psychiatric Association has become an ally of gay and lesbian equality. They have consistently withstood outside pressure from right wing organizations and instead chose to do what was in the best interest of GLBT mental health. Most notably, they endorsed same-sex civil marriage in a groundbreaking 2005 position paper.

In 1997, the APA first addressed ex-gay (or reparative) therapy by stating, “The potential risks of ‘reparative therapy’ are great and include depression, anxiety, and self-destructive behavior…Further, APA calls on these organizations and individuals to do all that is possible to decrease the stigma related to homosexuality wherever and whenever it may occur.”

In 2000, the APA issued an even stronger statement and recommended “that ethical practitioners refrain from attempts to change individuals sexual orientation, keeping in mind the medical dictum, to ‘first do no harm.’”

Unfortunately, a terribly misguided gay psychiatrist, Dr. David L. Scasta, is violating the spirit — if not the letter — of APA policy statements. In May, he will be part of a controversial symposium (Scasta calls it historic) he organized. It includes ex-gay therapist, Dr. Warren Throckmorton, who is the Sultan of Stigma and a leading purveyor of religion-based shame therapy.

Writing in the Association of Gay and Lesbian Psychiatrists’ newsletter, Scasta claims this forum will seek, “common ground” on “both sides of the religious divide.” He also urges that participants keep the symposium, “scientifically and rationally based” and hopes those on stage are committed to, “avoiding rhetoric.” Near the end of his article, Scasta claims his goal is to “ratchet down the forces of polarization.”

If the seminar’s mission is to let cooler heads prevail, inviting Throckmorton is a curious choice. An unlicensed psychologist who teaches at fundamentalist Grove City College, Throckmorton wrote an inflammatory paper for a right wing website titled, “Is Sexual Re-orientation Possible?”, that compared leaving homosexuality to quitting smoking. (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)

Op-ed by Wayne Besen

By the time victims of so-called “ex-gay” or conversion therapy reach me at TruthWinsOut.org, their self-esteem has been trampled and their self-worth is non-existent. These individuals were often betrayed by therapists who were supposed to be helping, but turned out to be the root cause of their enormous pain and suffering.

Sadly, such therapists have aligned themselves with religious organizations that send the detrimental message that if a gay client refuses to undergo sexual conversion or commit to a lifetime of celibacy he or she will be socially ostracized or will burn in Hell. From my experience, I have yet to see how such coercive and cruel treatment is conducive to good mental health.

Having studied the “ex-gay” movement for a decade and authored a book on the topic, “Anything But Straight: Unmasking the Scandals and Lies Behind the “Ex-Gay’ Myth,” I have found that conversion therapy is ineffective, harmful and anachronistic. These therapies don’t make clients heterosexual, nor do they help reconcile faith and sexuality. All that is accomplished, unfortunately, is enticing vulnerable clients to pay dearly for the identical shame and repression they previously received for free.

Regrettably, a well-financed cottage industry has arisen to deny reality and distort the lives of gay and lesbian people. This is evidenced by a group of politically motivated right wing counselors who filed a formal complaint in February with the American Counseling Association falsely claming that the ACA had violated its own polices and had stigmatized the beliefs of Christian counselors. It’ real goal, however, was to bully the ACA into allowing some practitioners to harm clients, while shielding this damage in the cloak of religious liberty.

In another example, last summer, right wing therapists wrote a letter to protest the American Psychological Association. They were expressing their outrage over an APA task force that will review current scientific research and stances on conversion therapy in a brazen attempt to intimidate the reviewers.

On behalf of the survivors of such therapy, I implore all mental health associations to withstand such political interference and resist the attempt to mainstream fringe therapies that harm gay and lesbian Americans.

There are three primary reasons why such therapy models should be definitively rejected. First, they confuse stereotypes with science. Secondly, they lack peer review studies and evidence that such therapies work — while there is a growing body of evidence that they hurt large numbers of people. Third, they rely on bizarre techniques that are a blight on the field of mental health. (Read More)

NEW YORK — TruthWinsOut.org (TWO) unveiled four new Internet videos today featuring prominent molecular biologist Dean Hamer, notable mental health expert and author Dr. Jack Drescher, ex-gay survivor Brent Almond and Nick Cavnar, who after decades left an ex-gay cult. This is the final week that the organization has released new educational videos addressing the “ex-gay” myth leading up to the March 3 launch of TWO’ updated website.

In today’ first video, molecular biologist Dr. Dean Hamer discusses biology, genetics and homosexuality. He also debunks the misinformation put forth by “ex-gay” organizations, such as Exodus and Focus on the Family.

In TWO’ second video, Dr. Jack Drescher, America’ foremost expert and scholar on GLBT mental health, answers questions on the efficacy of “ex-gay’ therapy. Drescher is a renowned scholar on issues of sexual orientation and a celebrated author.

Our third person featured is Brent Almond, who suffered through the ‘ex-gay’ ministries. In this video, he opens up to TruthWinsOut.org about his harrowing experience.

Finally, TWO interviews Nick Cavnar, a man who suppressed his sexuality, married and joined a Michigan cult that promised to cure him. This exclusive video details his long road to self-acceptance.

TruthWinsOut.org is a non-profit organization that counters right wing propaganda, exposes the “ex-gay” myth and educates America about gay life.

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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 ‚Äî 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)