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| By cherry-picking research, anti-gay groups manufacture this image about lgbts |
Monday's post on how the Family Research Council's Peter Sprigg was exposed and refuted on NPR during a debate on same-sex parenting has gone viral big time and it has me thinking.
One of the main reasons why it is difficult to get the truth out about the deceptive nature of organizations like FRC is due to their ability to exploit religious beliefs. They tend to use the phrase "personally held religious beliefs" as an excuse to push a variety of anti-lgbt points of view.
But in the case of NPR, no one was arguing about religious beliefs. It was purely about science and research. And it was because of this reason that Sprigg failed. And more than that, his failure epitomizes how anti-lgbt groups lie and distort. Religious right groups such as the Family Research Council, the American Family Association, the Liberty Counsel, etc. have a belief that homosexuality is a sin. and because of that, they stand against all facets of lgbt equality.
However, knowing that having a religious belief against homosexuality isn't enough to prevent pro-lgbts laws from being passed, they tend to distort or cherry-pick science in order to create the false idea that homosexuality itself is a so-called dangerous lifestyle.
Sometimes they are successful in pushing this meme, but other times they get caught lying. I have collected a few incidents over the years in which researchers, professors, Ph.Ds., and various others have called out anti-gay groups for distorting science. I've published this list a number of times but always enjoy re-publishing it because we need to hammer this into everyone's minds. The media won't do it, so it's up to us. And I prefer it that way:
In 2012, Seton Hall professor Dr. Theodora Sirota complained about how her work was being distorted by Rick Gibbons of the anti-gay groups NARTH (the National Association of Research and Therapy of Homosexuality) to make the case against same-sex families.
National Institute of Health director Francis Collins, who rebuked the right-wing American College of Pediatricians in 2010 for falsely claiming that he stated sexual orientation is not hardwired by DNA.
Six researchers of a 1997 Canadian study (Robert S. Hogg, Stefan A. Strathdee, Kevin J.P. Craib, Michael V. Shaughnessy, Julio Montaner, and Martin T. Schehter), who complained in 2001 that religious right groups were distorting their work to claim that gay men have a short life span.
The authors of the book Unequal Opportunity: Health Disparities Affecting Gay and Bisexual Men in the United States (Professors Richard J. Wolitski, Ron Stall, and Ronald O. Valdiserri), complained in 2009 that their work was being distorted by Focus on the Family.
University College London professor Michael King, complained in 2008 that the American Family Association was distorting his work on depression and suicide in LGBT individuals
University of Utah professor Lisa Diamond, also complained in 2008 that NARTH distorted her research on sexual orientation.
Dr. Carol Gilligan, Professor of Education and Law at New York University, complained in 2006 that former Focus on the Family head James Dobson misrepresented her research to attack LGBT families.
Dr. Kyle Pruett, Ph.D., a professor of child psychiatry at the Yale School of Medicine, also in 2006 complained that Focus on the Family distorted his work.
Dr. Robert Spitzer, Professor of Psychiatry at Columbia University, consistently complained that religious right groups distorted his study to claim that the LGBT orientation is easily changeable. In 2012, Spitzer apologized to the gay community for the original study which religious right groups were distorting.
Judith Stacey, Professor of Sociology at New York University, has had to, on more than one occasion, cry foul over how religious right groups distorted her work on LGBT families.
Greg Remafedi, Professor at the University of Minnesota, complained several times about how religious right groups such as the American College of Pediatricians and PFOX have distorted his work
John Horgan, a science journalist and Director of the Center for Science Writings at the Stevens Institute of Technology complained in 2010 that various religious right groups were distorting his work on homosexuality.
In 2011, Tom Minnery, a spokesman from Focus on the Family, was dressed down by Sen. Al Franken (D-MN) during a Congressional hearing for deliberately misrepresenting a study. Minnery initially used the study to claim, as Fitzgibbons did in his misrepresentation, that same-sex households are inferior to two parent mother/father households.
