The Los Angeles Times reports that antigay Christians and Jews are challenging and sometimes suing school districts: If proponents of tolerance and opponents of bullying are permitted classroom time, then — so the story goes — proponents of bigotry and reparative therapy must be given equal time.
The article covers a lot of territory; here’s a point-by-point summary:
Exodus president Alan Chambers is described as “married to a woman, a father of two” — the report fails to note that the children were adopted — and that Chambers opposes adoption by same-sex-attracted individuals.
The Times recognizes that the exgay activist rhetoric “echoes the creationist campaigns of the 1980s and ’90s: Just as conservative Christians demanded equal time for Genesis whenever Darwin got a mention, ex-gays and their allies are insisting on equal time for their views whenever homosexuality is discussed. Several ex-gay websites offer equal-time policies that parents can urge their local school boards to adopt.”
While the creationists have been pushed back, the Times notes that exgay activists are succeeding:
A high school in New Hampshire invited ex-gay activist Aaron Shorey to present his story on Civil Rights Day last year. He told several standing-room-only classes that he refused to let his attraction to men define him as gay. “I have experienced change,” he told them. “Change is possible.” He’s working with several other New England schools to get permission for similar presentations.
The ex-gay group Inqueery, based in Des Moines, has also sent speakers to public high schools, including one in Chicago this spring.
In Boulder, Colo., educators are considering including an ex-gay pamphlet in a resource guide to help teachers handle questions about sexuality. The pamphlet states that sexual identity is fluid and that conversion therapy can help some gays and lesbians overcome depression. The district — in one of the most liberal cities in the country — does not endorse that philosophy, but “we’re a big believer in providing all viewpoints,” spokeswoman Maela Moore said. “It would be negligent to omit.”
The Times says more challenges to local schools are on the way:
New Jersey-based JONAH — Jews Offering New Alternatives to Homosexuality — is seeking parents and students willing to sue to get the ex-gay view into schools. So is Liberty Counsel, a Christian law firm in Orlando, Fla. The firm joined PFOX last month in urging teens to form Gay to Straight Clubs and hang “Choose to Change” posters in their schools. If an administrator tries to censor that message, Liberty Counsel promises to provide legal backup.
Already this spring, the firm has threatened to take a Wisconsin high school to court for inviting a gay speaker — but not an ex-gay — to Diversity Day. (The school responded by canceling the program.) Liberty Counsel is also weighing action against colleges in Ohio and Connecticut after students said they were barred from putting ex-gay literature in the campus gay and lesbian centers.
The Times quotes NARTH president Joseph Nicolosi, who plainly states the exgay political agenda for schools — and reveals a callous contempt for children:
“There is no such thing as a homosexual. We are all heterosexual. Our body was designed for the opposite sex.”
The audience of more than 700 sat rapt in the pews of a Fort Lauderdale church. Some held Bibles. Others took notes. Nicolosi went on to tell them that fathers could help their sons stay straight by bonding through rough-and-tumble games, such as tossing them in the air.
“Even if [the dad] drops the kid and he cracks his head, at least he’ll be heterosexual,” Nicolosi said, chuckling. “A small price to pay.”
The Times quotes one critic who reads between the lines of the exgay message and finds a deliberate effort to wound people…
“There’s a fine line between saying ‘Change is possible, and I have changed’ and saying ‘Change is possible, and you better change because something’s wrong with you,’ ” said Eliza Byard, deputy executive director of the nonprofit Gay, Lesbian & Straight Education Network.
… and another critic who says that exgay therapy drove him into deep depression:
Protesting the ex-gay conference in Florida, Jerry Stephenson said his three years in conversion therapy plunged him into despair and self-loathing. He could not break his attraction to men; ashamed of his weakness, he contemplated suicide. Today, Stephenson counsels others on accepting their homosexuality.
The idea of promoting conversion therapy in schools frightens him: “Let’s save the children from this,” Stephenson said. “All it does is bring oppression.”
The Times quotes Dr. Robert Spitzer, a psychiatrist at Columbia University, saying that some of his subjects in a 2001 study of exgays may have been deceiving themselves or lying to him.
“If some people can change — and I think they can — it’s a pretty rare phenomenon,” said Spitzer, a strong supporter of gay rights. Promoting conversion therapy in schools, he added, may be giving teens “false hope.”
Guidelines jointly developed this year by GLSEN and conservative Christians may make it easier for exgay activists to gain access to public school classrooms.
But…
That doesn’t necessarily mean all views deserve a place in the curriculum, said Charles Haynes, a 1st Amendment scholar who mediated the process. Educators must decide which perspectives are scientifically valid and which lessons will help their students grow. But Haynes is adamant that the ex-gay community at least deserves a hearing.
Maybe the Flat Earth Society should be invited to astronomy courses to give an “opposing viewpoint.” (Doesn’t matter that we actually have photographs of the earth – from the moon – and it is, in fact, round – we have to give that all important opposing viewpoint, no matter how idiotic!)
Maybe we should invite faith healers like Benny Hinn to teach a segment in faith healing at Harvard Medical School of Neurology to give an “opposing viewpoint,” no matter how discredited.
Geez, give me a break. Education (and, yes, the truth) are not decided by what some pompous, sanctimonious oafs (or is it oaves?) who think that popular opinion should decide what the truth should be and by virtue of the fact that this is her/her belief makes it valid for the rest of us.
What is is and what isn’t isn’t. It’s just that simple. I have a real problem with some delusional clod insisting that hard, proven facts are wrong and he/she is right by virtue of his/her misguided beliefs.
Thoughts anyone?
There are a few quirks in that article, but at least they sort of got one thing right, the opener: (paraphrasing)
Exgay has no place in the school system — not because they make these claims about themselves, but because of the anti-gay claims they also make.But what would we know. “People”, as Alan’s photo says “need alternatives”, and hence I suggest the KKK and neo-nazi skinheads be be likewise invited. Just for that all important “alternative viewpoint”, of course.As that is all that matters; no consideration need be given to whether the claims are valid, stretched, invented, or merely created out of thin air by a marketing department in Colorado Springs.
“There’s a fine line between saying ‘Change is possible, and I have changed’ and saying ‘Change is possible, and you better change because something’s wrong with you,’ ” said Eliza Byard.
I’m with Eliza. Implicit in “you can change” is “you should change because you’re bad”. Canada got rid of holocaust denier Ernst Zundel for telling harmful lies, surely there must be a way to hold the antigay “exgay” liars legally accountable as well.
The usual outreach is to be there for those who they say are ‘struggling’ with homosexuality.
Well, children aren’t the developed into really realizing THAT yet right?
How can it be a struggle if there haven’t been any real difficulties with being gay?
Then you’d have to factor in the motive: if it’s religious, saving souls from the brink of hell, it’s inappropriate to introduce into a public school.
If the churches aren’t persuasive enough, that’s too bad. That’s THEIR job, not that of public school teachers.
The other part of this is privacy. If a child had an actual clinical problem with depression, or bi polar disorder or even schizophrenia (the onset begins around ages 17-22) there are no psychiatrists allowed to come in and teach in schools on it as it’s sufferes being BAD people or in for a bad life of unhappiness and prejudice so take this pill or do this discipline and you’ll be a happy person.
That wouldn’t be allowed, and no parents with that issue in their family life is suing for a psychiatrist to do so.
No, it’s inappropriate for a school to introduce something that’s not clinically organic,unlicensed or supported by the legitimate psychiatric community.
Indeed, it IS a school’s job to reduce prejudice and support the successful integration of students with each other.
Especially if being gay has no bearing on academic performance or adjustment with one’s friends in school.
In this case of premature access to children whose ‘struggle’ isn’t determined yet, I’d say the real struggle is in the parent’s minds, not their gay childs.
And in that regard, the child isn’t given the option of choosing how to address his orientation, the ADULTS are.
I want someone to suggest that the Jews in this equation consider the alternative to being a Jew.
After all, accepting Jesus as your Saviour is the only real way to heaven.
Especially since Jews don’t believe in heaven or hell as Christians do.
Jews can change into Christians, after all it’s a ‘struggle’ out there to be a Jew.
Since before Christ. And look at all the Jews who converted then.
There’s a lot of people who don’t want Jews to exist or Israel to be run by Jews.
The Holocaust proves international and traditional disapproval and dislike of Jews, so therefore the majority would be right to offer Jews the option of changing.
If these people in this school think for a second that’s acceptable, then the Jews in this situation shouldn’t be engaged in giving anyone an option to switch identity based on ‘struggle’.
The insult towards Jews is just as implicit as it is for gay people.
Enough people don’t like you, so you better disappear.
Regan, that’s an excellent point about no parents asking psychiatrists to intervene in schools when schizophrenia or depression is present in children. The “exgays” like to analogize being gay with having a disease but if they believe that why treat being gay different from diseases like schizophrenia? Why does being gay as a disease deserve special treatment and if it is a disease caused by distant fathers and sexual abuse what need is there to be in schools pretending its a choice in need of being discouraged?