How NOM links gays to pedophilia while keeping its hands clean

Maggie Gallagher of NOM

" . . . although NOM says it has no evidence that gay men molest children at higher rates than straight men, it frequently links to websites of others who claim to. We also point out that NOM, despite its claims, keeps bringing up the subject of children and sex." - Mark Potok of the Southern Poverty Law Center

One of the revelations coming out about the scandal involving National Organization for Marriage and the release of their confidential files is how the group sought to confuse the issue of marriage equality by bringing up issues of "children's innocence," as if to imply that allowing gays and lesbians to marry will damage children.

In a story which was supposed to come out in May but got moved up, the Southern Poverty Law Center breaks down just how NOM does this.

The piece, NOM Lets Others Do Their Dirty Work,  is probably one of the best take downs of NOM's deceptions that I have ever read :

Last Nov. 15, the Ruth Institute, a project of the NOM Education Fund, published the first eight paragraphs of an essay by anti-gay activist Michael Brown that asked what topic even far-right radio host Rush Limbaugh might be afraid to bring up in the face of “political correctness.” The part of the essay on the Ruth Institute website didn’t say what that topic was, but gave a “Keep Reading” link to a site run by an openly gay-bashing hate group, the American Family Association.

There, it took readers another three paragraphs to get to the red meat: “Could it be that the [Penn State] sex abuse scandal involved a man allegedly abusing boys, meaning that the acts were homosexual in nature? And could it be that even Rush Limbaugh didn’t have the guts to address this? (Contrary to the protestations of some, a man who is sexually involved with boys is a homosexual pedophile; a man who is sexually involved with girls is a heterosexual pedophile.)”

Brown was clearly suggesting that accused pedophile Jerry Sandusky, Penn’s assistant football coach until the scandal broke, was a gay man. But actually, as is well known, that’s false. Anti-gay activists claim that all men who molest male children are homosexual. But researchers long ago established that there are two types of molesters: fixated and regressive. Fixated molesters — the stereotypical pedophile — typically molest children of either sex, but have no sexual interest in any adult and can’t be considered heterosexual or homosexual. Regressive molesters are attracted to adults, but may “regress” to children under stress; most of them have been found to be heterosexual in their adult relationships. That’s why the American Psychological Association has officially concluded that “homosexual men are not more likely to sexually abuse children than heterosexual men.”

To NOM’s many critics in the LGBT community, this is par for NOM’s course. For more than a year now, gay rights activists have alleged that NOM is playing a shell game, avoiding the most egregiously false defamations of gay people on its own website, but linking directly to others who don’t. The charge had enough impact that Maggie Gallagher — who co-founded NOM in 2007, is past chairwoman of the board, and remains a key NOM spokeswoman — felt forced to respond.

In a Dec. 9 post entitled “A Link Is Not An Endorsement,” Gallagher said such an argument “would lead to the absurd conclusion” that NOM agrees with the editorial positions of The New York Times or The Advocate, an LGBT newspaper. She didn’t mention the fact that the anti-gay article “leaders” on NOM’s site are almost always presented without any hint of criticism and, to all appearances, do seem to be endorsed by NOM. Some are simply republications of essays without any introductory commentary, while others feature laudatory introductions.

Gallagher added a noteworthy comment to her recent post: “I would like to say personally that nothing in any argument I’ve ever made on gay marriage rests on the idea that same-sex couples harm their children at any higher rates than any other family form. (If there is data that shows this, I’ve never seen it.)”

 Then SPLC documents that aside from publishing links to shoddy research on its blog to connect homosexuality and pedophilia, NOM will also push material accusing gays of teaching children:

NOM last September sent out mailers to thousands of New Yorkers warning of the “legal consequences” of gay marriage. Although virtually all NOM’s assertions were questionable, one stood out — the claim that a sex education teacher in Massachusetts “taught her students to perform lesbian sex.” The claim was based on an NPR story that quoted the teacher saying her state’s marriage equality law made her feel more comfortable teaching. She used charts to explain different kinds of sex to students — but did not, as NOM hints, demonstrate how to “perform” it.

The focus of the scandal is now on how NOM admitted in its document to drive a wedge between the black and gay community, attention does need to be paid to how NOM tries to link homosexuality and pedophilia, while simultaneously claiming that two aren't linked.






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