Today’s Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports (free subscription required):
About 1,000 people, from 22 states, paid $60 a piece to attend the “Love Won Out” convention that lasted all day and featured eight speakers. About 50 activists gathered on the sidewalk.
How much did the conference cost Focus on the Family, and what was the organization’s net income? The AJC doesn’t say.
Inside, Sarah Tate, a 62-year-old from Gwinnett County lamented the antagonism between the groups: “It [Love Won Out] is a very understanding way of trying to be helpful and not as judgmental as most people think Christians are,” she said. “What a shame because they [protestors] have a biased view. If they came inside, they would realize it’s about compassion.”
The article neglects to provide either context or alternative views regarding that “compassion.” Readers might have benefited from knowledge of Focus on the Family’s nationwide lobbying to promote discrimination, to enact so-called “sodomy laws,” and to prohibit gay couples in states such as Virginia and Oklahoma from forming lasting relationships, sharing households and other property contractually, or raising their biological or adopted children. Exodus International, the ex-gay umbrella network, and NARTH, the reparative-therapy advocacy group, aren’t even mentioned in the article, and so their political activities go unreported as well.
The conventioneers broke up into groups and listened quietly to speakers on topics that included “Straight Thinking On Gay Marriage,” and “Responding to Pro-Gay Theology.”
The article offers no specifics from any of the speakers. Readers are not given any quotes by Joe Dallas, which might have exposed — in Dallas’ own words — the speaker’s prejudices toward Christians whose “theology” refuses to single out homosexuals for harassment. Readers are not informed of Joseph Nicolosi’s tendency at Love Won Out events to denigrate wives and to encourage dangerous behaviors between fathers and sons. Nor are we told that Nicolosi’s organization (unnamed by the AJC) unapologetically hosted racist propaganda on its web site until recently. And readers are not informed that gay and tolerant people of faith are protesting Focus on the Family because of the organization’s “straight thinking” to make marriage, civil unions, and domestic partnerships illegal between two people of the same gender.
The article quotes one Mike Haley but fails to note that he is the chairman of Exodus International:
“[The conference is] It’s for people who want to walk away from homosexuality, but we’re not forcing anybody. We’re not going into gay bars and pulling people out.”
Here again, the newspaper failed to tell its readers that Exodus and Focus on the Family believe that marriage and numerous civil rights should be withheld from homosexuals in order to coerce them to “change.”
The newspaper reports that Mike Haley once lived as a homosexual but stopped 15 years ago. It fails to report Haley’s young age at the time he supposedly turned straight, and it fails to report his activities when he claimed to be gay — mature relationships? youthful experimental sex? bisexual dating? prostitution?
Ditto for the article’s reference to Alan Chambers:
Still, no one is bound to live a homosexual life, speaker Alan Chambers argued. Once Chambers lived life as a homosexual. Now he is married to a woman and the father of two children. He’s on the Love Won Out tour as a paid speaker.
The newspaper fails to identify Chambers as the president of Exodus, fails define what a singular “homosexual life” would be, fails to report that Chambers only identified as “gay” for a few years as a randy teen-ager, and fails to report that Chambers adopted.
Addendum: The Atlanta Journal-Constitution’s report is shallow at best, and recklessly biased at worst.
Two things that I find interesting in the post and article. In the article, Alan acknowledges the “ex-gay for pay” line that has been used on him (as well as all the rest of the public faces of the ex-gay movement). I guess he figures that his audience is thinking the same thing as his critics and is trying to deflect it with humor.
The other thing that I have a hard time swallowing is that Alan Chambers can adopt in Florida, but openly gay, honest citizens in Florida cannot adopt. That just blows my mind. If Florida really is committed to denying adoption to gay folks, how could anyone sit down with Alan Chambers for a home-study and not come away from that experience without realizing he is gay.
I guess the answer for any gay or lesbian couples in Florida is to say that they are ex-gay and just living together to provide support. Then after the adoption decide that they failed in their ex-gay attempt just like everyone else. At least they would have completed their adoption.
And yes, I am being sarcastic.
I know, I was disappointed in the AJC article, too. They should have reported that Leslie and I adopted our kids and that both of us were infertile and also how much we paid for our house. Thankfully we have you all to fill in the gaps.
Contrary to your not so veiled assertions, Leslie and I adopted our kids because we love them and want to provide them with a great home and the opportunity to have a mom and a dad.
And, John, in Florida there are more than 4,000 kids in “the system” needing to be adopted. If a gay man and lesbian woman decided to put their sexuality on the back burner, get married and provide a stable, nurturing and loving homelife for an adopted child I would say they are doing more than most Christians. The point is that kids need a mom and a dad—not that gay people are horrible parents.
If a gay man and lesbian woman decided to put their sexuality on the back burner, get married and provide a stable, nurturing and loving homelife for an adopted child I would say they are doing more than most Christians.
Yes, making their lives a complete lie would create a wonderful environment in which to nurture a child.
The point is that kids need a mom and a dad—not that gay people are horrible parents.
That’s a nice sounding sound bite but so far the research doesn’t seem to support it.
Alan,
I didn’t make any veiled comments about why you or your wife adopted. What I spoke to was the rediculous nature of Florida’s ban on gay and lesbian people from adopting, while allowing someone who acknowledges being gay in the past but now identifies as ex-gay to adopt.
Your suggestion that a gay man and lesbian could get together and “put their sexuality on the back burner” in order to adopt in Florida would still not work unless they were willing to lie. If they were to answer honestly to the question of whether they were gay/lesbian or not, they would be made inelligible to adopt in your state. Your suggestion is really no more useful than mine. It still requires lying (probably under oath and subject to perjury prosecution since these are legal documents submitted to state courts).
Although I didn’t express any interest in how much anyone paid for their house, I, like many others am curious about how lucrative it is to be a professional ex-gay for the Religious Right.
John said:
Although I didn’t express any interest in how much anyone paid for their house, I, like many others am curious about how lucrative it is to be a professional ex-gay for the Religious Right.
Alan is refering to an XGW post from last year I believe in which someone mentioned that he sold his house for something over $300K. I thought it was a silly thing to discuss then (and said so) and I think it even more absurd that Alan mentions it here now. Of all the insulting things you have said and done in the interim Alan, this is what you hold onto?
Alan, how about your sharing the stage with Wellington Boone as he took pride in calling us “faggots and sissies” among other vile things. Not a peep from you but instead you repeated your usual tepid lines which for some reason you believe are earthshaking. Perhaps you would like to discuss this?
Unfortunately, I’ve learned not to expect replies from you on things of substance. Why do you only comment and run as you did above?
My oldest son is adopted, and I love him dearly. He’s old enough now to have a job at a biotech here in SoCal — perhaps it’s just a parent talking, but he’s turned out to be a wonderful young man.
But, changing the subject to a topic reply, I read Alan Chambers ‘quote:
I’m not sure what the statement means. It reads like a Having Your Cake (Failure To Assert, or Diminished Claim) argument.
But, what I really don’t suppose Chambers is stating his approval of the non-traditional adoption a girl by Supervisor Bevan Dufty and Rebecca Goldfader (as the parents currently identify as a gay and a lesbian), as Chambers in his blog (sub-headered As I See Things) posted the report by the American College of Pediatricians entitled Irresponsible to Change the Age-Old Prohibition on Homosexual Parenting.It probably should be noted that the Boston Globe, in their article Beliefs drive research agenda of new think tanks, said of the American College of Pediatrics:
If a gay man and lesbian woman decided to put their sexuality on the back burner, get married and provide a stable, nurturing and loving homelife for an adopted child I would say they are doing more than most Christians.
If a gay man or lesbian woman decided to provide a stable, nurturing and loving homelife for an adopted child I would say they are doing more than most OTHER Christians. And anyone who doesn’t have an anti-gay agenda would agree.
Yesterday I had lunch at The Abbey in West Hollywood, a mostly-gay establishment located next to a park. It was a beautiful day and as we sat enjoying the sunshine, we couldn’t help but notice that nearly every group that passed by had small children.
At one point a doting grandmother sat at our table while her son (Daddy) was getting the car. Papa was off somewhere else yesterday and she was enjoying lunch with her son and twin granddaughters (they were surprised when they found out that the woman who’s kid they were going to adopt was carrying twins but OF COURSE they wanted both).
I did notice one odd thing about the day. None of the kids seemed unhappy or fretful. The baby girl at our table was smiling (and drooling) and completely beautiful. Only the most inhumane of people would turn these happy healthy kids into political fodder to attach their parents. If they were lacking anything at all in their “need” for a male and a female parent, it certainly wasn’t showing.
Alan Chambers said “If a gay man and lesbian woman decided to put their sexuality on the back burner, get married and provide a stable, nurturing and loving homelife for an adopted child I would say they are doing more than most Christians. The point is that kids need a mom and a dad”.
Alan, a man and a woman who aren’t attracted to each other don’t make the most stable couple to provide a nurturing and loving home. A couple that’s attracted to each other, regardless of gender makes for a stable environment – the social science research says children raised in
same sex households do just as well as those raised by opposite sex couples.
“Once Chambers lived life as a homosexual. Now he is married to a woman and the father of two children. He’s on the Love Won Out tour as a paid speaker.”
He “lived life as a homosexual”, now he is “living life AS” a heterosexual. Living “as” is not the same thing as “being” straight. According to Alan’s own testimony, he was unable to consummate his marriage for months. Now, he’s being paid for it. Doesn’t that make him “exgay for pay”?