Janet Folger distorts studies to defend Sally Kern - should we be shocked?
Sally Kern was on a local program, KFOR TV's Flashpoint, talking about her comments.
Taking the other side of the debate was Scott Jones, an openly gay pastor at the Cathedral Of Hope in Oklahoma City.
I was very disappointed.
I understand the need to not shout and talk over each other during a debate but Mr. Jones was a little too milquetoast for my tastes. Kern talked over him and was able to go off on long monologues.
It wouldn't have hurt for him to say every now and then, "Excuse me ma'am but can I get a word in edgewise."
Really though, that sort of thing is a conundrum in our community. On one hand, we have people who want extreme action regarding Kern and folks like her. They have sent ugly emails to her expressing their objections to her comments.
And on the other, folks with access to television and the media seem to appeal to the victim mentality:
"Sally Kern's words are going to cause more hate to be thrown at the lgbt community. More gays may get beaten up because of her."
I don't like either voice. One is too ugly and the other makes lgbts look like victims.
There has to be a medium. And I have yet to see it played out.
A lot of what Kern said is incorrect on a scientific level. But she plays that Anita Bryant card. That is when someone says some of the most outrageous things about lgbts, but then claim that "love" caused them to say such things.
"I don't hate homosexuals," they would say, "I just hate their lifestyle."
Why is it so impossible for someone to say "Sally Kern, you have claimed that medical information says that homosexuality is a deadly lifestyle. Let's see you back it up."
Yes I have said this on more than one occasion. And I am saying it again because I have yet to see someone ask her about this.
And that debate was yet another way for her to hide her lies behind her religion.
Meanwhile, our friend Janet Folger has risen to defend Kern. And she distorts medical information:
The Canadian Medical Association Journal (Jan. 11, 2000) said, "Among young gay and bisexual men in Vancouver, the HIV/AIDS epidemic has reduced life expectancy by up to 20 years."
According to the New England Journal of Medicine (Feb. 12, 1998), smoking, on the other hand, reduces your life expectancy "7.3 years for men and 6.0 years for women."
Homosexuality is three times more dangerous than smoking. Think about that when they insist on teaching it to your children. And that doesn't even touch the other life-threatening risks ranging from hepatitis to fatal rectal cancer.
Folger omitted that in 2001, the authors of the Vancouver study went on record saying that their work was being distorted. They also said:
It is essential to note that the life expectancy of any population is a descriptive and not a prescriptive mesaure. Death is a product of the way a person lives and what physical and environmental hazards he or she faces everyday. It cannot be attributed solely to their sexual orientation or any other ethnic or social factor. If estimates of an individual gay and bisexual man's risk of death is truly needed for legal or other purposes, then people making these estimates should use the same actuarial tables that are used for all other males in that population. Gay and bisexual men are included in the construction of official population-based tables and therefore these tables for all males are the appropriate ones to be used.
You see people like Folger is where Kern gets her information. And while we are focused on the religious aspect of what is said or how to be victims, Folger gets away with peddling her lies.
By concentrating on the ugly emails and then debating folks who seem to go overboard in being "polite," Kern and her defenders are slowly doing very well to turn the lgbt community into the aggressors and her as the innocent victim.
And whose fault is that?
(Apologies in advance for my cross-posting from Pam.)
ReplyDeleteI get why an openly-gay pastor would want to sit there and argue Biblical points with someone on the other side of the fence. But for a forum like they had there, I think it was entirely the wrong argument to try and tackle and the wrong tactic altogether.
First of all, there's the audience: most anyone listening in the local area is going to believe anything that Kern says about what the Bible supposedly says about homosexuality as a given without even thinking about what she's actually saying, and will also automatically dismiss any argument to the contrary. So, no matter how cogent his argument, the pastor automatically loses.
Secondly, and I think more importantly, why is it not at all challenged that she has any right to be promoting her religion in her official capacity as a public official? Everyone on that show gave her a pass on this issue and never seemed to question it. She was elected to represent ALL of her constituents equally (which she is showing that she cannot do without bias), and I'm sure took an oath to uphold the Constitution (which requires Separation of Church and State).
THIS is where the line has to be drawn: you're allowed to wear one hat or the other but not both! (And it's too bad we can't seem to stem the tide of how important people seem to think it is what religion Obama is, or have a discussion at the national level about the importance of religious neutrality in our elected officials instead of everyone trying to out-Christian each other.) I applaud all of the people who study the Bible and are willing to work inside the church to change it from within, but the main battleground has to be to keep politics out of the voting booth and get it through the heads of our representatives "what does the Bible say" is NOT supposed to be the litmus test for how they should vote!